


crack my heart open with your bitter hands (watch me bloom)

by rosestone



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/F, Second War with Voldemort, Spies & Secret Agents
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-06
Updated: 2020-06-06
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:01:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 32,741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24573472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosestone/pseuds/rosestone
Summary: Pansy Parkinson's plan to earn a Dark Mark goes drastically awry when Ginny Weasley manages to convince the Dark Lord she's Death Eater material.  But she has a plan: prove Weasley's a liar and a spy.  Easy.Weasley has other plans.
Relationships: Pansy Parkinson/Ginny Weasley
Comments: 6
Kudos: 48
Collections: Fandom 5K 2020





	crack my heart open with your bitter hands (watch me bloom)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [reeby10](https://archiveofourown.org/users/reeby10/gifts).



Pansy Parkinson was proud to stand in the Dark Lord's presence.

She wasn't a Death Eater, of course. She was far too young, far too inexperienced. The only one their age who'd had that honour so far was Draco. Of course, he'd had special circumstances involved; not everyone could be as lucky as he'd been, to be given such an important task while still in school. But she was still here, wasn't she? Someday the Dark Lord would decide to choose someone new to bear his mark. Perhaps his eye would fall on her.

Or perhaps he'd be taken in by a liar.

No. Pansy jerked her mind away from the thought. It was foolish to doubt someone as powerful as he was, as all-knowing, no matter how irritated she was.

Still... she really had no idea why he was bothering to listen to Ginny Weasley.

Weasley's hair stood out brightly in the sea of black robes that surrounded her. All of the Death Eaters were here to watch whatever the Dark Lord chose to do with her, as were the other un-Marked inhabitants of the house. Pansy had thought, when they'd been invited to watch the entertainment, that maybe the Dark Lord was going to give someone else the Mark tonight; it wasn't as though he was in the habit of letting them in on any of his other meetings with the Death Eaters, after all.

Instead, they'd gotten this: trying to find a place to stand at the back of the crowd that'd still allow them to see what was going on, and waiting to see if the Dark Lord actually believed her claim that she wanted to follow him.

"Why," Mr Malfoy said, lip curled, "would _you_ want to become a Death Eater?"

"My father's obsession with Muggles has ruined our family," Weasley said calmly. "I've had quite a lot of time to reflect on that over the course of my life."

Why in Merlin's name was Weasley so collected? She was a _Gryffindor_. None of them knew how to hold their tempers. Pansy had seen Weasley's brothers get into plenty of fights at Hogwarts, and she was fairly sure the only reason _this_ Weasley hadn't was because she'd been so quiet her first few years there that Pansy might have missed her entirely if it hadn't been for the hair.

Weasley should have been frightened, at the very least. Unless she was actually too stupid to understand that she was surrounded by Death Eaters who expected she'd turn out to be an inept spy. Quite possible - look at her brother, after all - though Pansy supposed there had to be some amount of cleverness in her family, or the twins never would have gotten away with half as much as they did. Perhaps they'd gotten all of it. Perhaps this Weasley had been the only one stupid enough to offer herself up to spy on an organisation that wouldn't hesitate to kill her.

"It doesn't seem as though the rest of them agree with that, or you wouldn't be alone here."

She shrugged. "They're stubborn, and they haven't had the opportunities that I've had to see what blood purity _really_ means. I suppose Percy might come around eventually, given time - he's got no love for Dumbledore and his followers - but the rest of them might take a little more convincing. If they can be convinced at all."

"And your uncles?" he said softly, eyes narrowed. "The Prewett brothers? They died for Dumbledore. You really expect us to believe you'd join us with _that_ in your family's history?"

"They did what they thought was best, given the knowledge they had at the time. Should I waste myself fighting for the same idiotic cause when I know better? I can't imagine they'd want me to. If I had the ability, I'd go back and speak to them, do my best to convince them they were on the wrong side of history - but perhaps it wouldn't be possible. I'm sure many people here have a few unfortunate branches on their family tree."

Someone scoffed. Glancing around, Pansy saw Mr Nott, with Theo standing wide-eyed behind him.

"None of this proves you're actually here to join us," Mr Nott said, sneering at Weasley. "All you're doing is talking philosophy and insulting those of us from _truly_ pure families. I see no reason we shouldn't just kill you for a spy and be done with it."

"Peace, Hector," the Dark Lord said. "Though he does have a point. I invite you to prove yours, Miss Weasley."

"Of course, my Lord." Weasley reached slowly into a pocket with her left hand; around her, Death Eaters tensed, watching for a wand. "I believe this is yours. I'd like to return it."

Pansy couldn't quite see what she was holding. It was black, and not particularly large, and rectangular - a book, maybe? None of the Death Eaters nearer to Weasley seemed to know what it was either - except Mr Malfoy, maybe. He was staring at it like she'd just held out an Erumpent horn, primed and ready to explode.

"Where did you get that from?" the Dark Lord said softly, eyes narrowed.

Ginny shrugged nonchalantly. "This time around? Malfoy Manor, my lord. Honestly, I'd expected their wards to be more of a challenge, but perhaps money can't buy everything. But _originally_ I found it in my schoolbooks at the beginning of my first year at Hogwarts. It was ever so educational."

"Is that so." He looked slowly across at Mr Malfoy, whose face was draining white. "Lucius?"

"I - I'd had the impression it was a weapon, my Lord. And Arthur Weasley was doing all he could to drive your faithful into the ground - I had so many Dark relics I needed to protect that he would have destroyed without a thought, allowing him to get his hands on the item you'd left me without using it as you'd intended seemed like a terrible waste -"

"And so you gave it to... her." The Dark Lord cast an assessing gaze down Weasley. "You opened the Chamber?"

"I didn't know or understand what was happening," Weasley said with a shrug. "Frankly, my Lord, if somebody had asked me my opinions on your cause then I would have just parroted my parents. Tom didn't try to convert me. I was nothing more than a puppet to him, and the more aware I became of that, the more frightened I was and the less likely I was to believe anything he said. No, I only really came around later. He left memories, you know. I don't think he _meant_ to, but I don't think the connection between us was meant to be cut the way it was, either. I was too frightened at first to try exploring them, but eventually I got curious. Seeing how you'd come to the conclusion that we needed to fight back against the Muggles was very convincing."

"I see." He stared down at her for a moment longer. "Macnair. Bring a Muggle."

Pansy watched, wide-eyed, as one of the Death Eaters levitated a Muggle into the room. It wasn't like she didn't know that they practised spells on them sometimes - Mr Malfoy had killed one in front of them when they'd first been invited to the manor, as a warning not to get in the way of those more powerful than they were - but it wasn't something they were usually allowed to witness, either. That was only for the real Death Eaters.

Normally, anyway.

Macnair dropped the man on the floor in the middle of the room; the nearest Death Eaters shifted back, forming a ring around him and Weasley.

She glanced up at the Dark Lord, no nervousness visible. "Do you have any preferences, my Lord?"

He flicked a hand dismissively. "Do as you like."

Weasley nodded and turned away, gazing at the Muggle. He was crouching on the floor, eyes flicking around the ring with a bitter resignation Pansy found unsettlingly familiar. Not something she'd seen here - everybody was proud to be here, after all, and even if they'd regretted their choice they never would have dared show it - something -

Hogwarts.

Pansy had been safe at Hogwarts. She wasn't a blood traitor, after all, and the Carrows had more or less left the Slytherins alone, secure in their conviction that the house would follow the Dark Lord's lead in its entirety. But she had been expected to watch when they doled out punishment and to show her approval - because, of course, only blood traitors _wouldn't_ like watching their own receive punishments for their rebelliousness. She'd seen that expression... quite a few times, actually. Usually Longbottom, who'd seemed to feel it was his job to throw himself between the Carrows and whoever they were punishing, never mind that he clearly hated the experience, but she'd seen it on some of the others, too. Children, sometimes. It had frightened her that they seemed to take that experience for granted at such a young age.

Of course, they were blood traitors. If they'd only been clever enough to change their ways, they would have escaped punishment altogether. And of course they were nothing at all like this Muggle, because no matter how traitorous they were and how corrupted their family lines, they still had magic. Muggles were barely more than animals. Pansy knew that.

The sight of the Muggle flinching back as Weasley raised her wand in his direction, smart enough to understand something bad was going to happen even if he didn't know magic was real, still made her stomach twist.

" _Crucio!_ "

Pansy bit her lip deeply, using the pain as a shield to keep her from flinching. No true witch would shy away from the sight of a Muggle in pain - she _knew_ that - but he reacted the same way as the children had, Merlin, exactly the same - but she couldn't show it. She couldn't. The Death Eaters didn't care, did they? Their only reaction seemed to be interest, staring at Weasley as if they'd expected her to start with a Tickling Jinx instead.

Which was obviously a much more reasonable reaction. Of course a Weasley shouldn't know how to cast the Cruciatus curse. That _was_ weird. Pansy held onto that thought as the Muggle's voice rose and cracked, focused on it as Weasley cut the spell and turned back to the Dark Lord. How strange. Weasleys just didn't do things like that.

"Shall I continue, my Lord?"

He stared down at her. "Have you cast that spell before?"

"Only on animals, my Lord."

"Fascinating. Yes. Again."

Pansy breathed in and out and thought about Hogwarts. It was better not to interrupt punishments. That had happened a few times early on in her seventh year, when nobody knew what to expect from the Carrows yet. It was always worse if they were stopped, because they'd usually take it out twofold on whoever'd interrupted them. Sometimes they went back to their original target afterwards, though they didn't always. Eventually the only one who'd been game to interrupt was Longbottom, who clearly had something wrong with him to so much as _consider_ it. He'd barely ever been allowed to go to the hospital wing afterwards, either.

The Muggle had gone hoarse. Now thinking about Hogwarts was a problem, because that hadn't happened often there but when it had it'd been very bad, very bad indeed, bad enough that even Snape hadn't been willing to let it continue. She needed not to think about that. She needed -

The spell cut off. Pansy pressed sweaty palms against her robes, glad she wasn't Marked yet. She'd have to stand a lot closer if she were, and that seemed too dangerous to risk right now.

"Have you cast the Killing Curse?" the Dark Lord asked.

"A few times, my Lord," Weasley said. "Not reliably, and not on anything larger than a dog."

"A pity. You'll have to work on that. Choose another spell, and end it. I grow tired of this."

"Yes, my Lord." Weasley turned back to the Muggle, twirling her wand in her fingers.

Pansy let out a subtle breath. This was okay. This was fine. All right, so punishments at Hogwarts hadn't usually ended with outright murder, but this had to be kinder, right? The Muggle wasn't here as an honoured guest. At least if he died now they wouldn't be torturing him any more.

Not that Pansy cared. Not that she _ought_ to care. He was a Muggle and an animal and she was going to be a Death Eater, and, and - clearly this was Weasley's fault. She was distracted and reminded of Hogwarts. No wonder she kept thinking things like that, with her right there like they were back in the Great Hall. She never should have come here; a Weasley joining the Dark Lord was just unnatural.

" _Sectumsempra!_ "

Pansy flinched back from the spray of blood. 

Weasley didn't. She turned to the Dark Lord, face painted red, and asked, "Have I proven myself to your satisfaction, my Lord?"

He tipped his head to the side, staring down at her from red eyes. "Yes. You have."

The meeting didn't last much longer. Pansy was glad to slip out when the non-Death Eaters were dismissed; she'd been too far away to be struck by the blood, but being in the same room as the body had made her uneasy. And being in the same room as Weasley, come to think. The whole situation was just... strange.

Weasley hadn't left with the rest of them. Pansy had caught her eye on the way out and flinched back from the look on her face; it'd reminded her of Umbridge, almost, her utter certainty that she knew precisely what was going to happen and that it'd be good for her and her alone. Weasley wasn't quite as creepy, though - well, as long as she discounted the blood.

Pansy lingered in the manor's hallway, watching as the others dispersed to their rooms or the library or the duelling chambers. Staying around a Death Eater meeting didn't seem like a particularly good idea, but... she really wanted to know what was going on with Weasley. She wouldn't find that out if she just left.

Not that she could listen in on the Dark Lord, of course. That would just be stupid. But she could stay somewhere she could see the door, maybe, and see whether Weasley actually left alive. And, if so, what she did afterwards.

Pansy knew she shouldn't. She'd heard enough rumours about what the Dark Lord was like when he was angry to know she'd regret it if she were caught; she was only safe here as she didn't upset the Dark Lord, and that didn't seem like it'd extend to getting caught eavesdropping.

But...

She didn't like the way Weasley had looked at her, like this was all some great joke she hadn't worked out yet. Like she knew something Pansy didn't. And she didn't like that Weasley was here, either. Why on earth was everyone so willing to believe she'd turned on her family? It was ridiculous. She'd spent all those years hanging on to Potter's coat-tails, and now all she had to do was show up and throw a few curses around and she was practically a Death Eater? It was ridiculous. It couldn't be that she was offering information, either: she'd overheard one Weasley or another complaining about their mother's overprotective tendencies often enough, hadn't she? There was no way Weasley _had_ information to offer.

Pansy walked up the stairs as if she had nothing better to do than go to her room and ducked into an empty bedroom at the top. If she held her head at the right angle she could see all the way down the stairs through the keyhole. Which was obviously not the same as listening in on Death Eaters, at all, so she ought to be fine. Probably.

Weasley had better do something interesting.

It was another twenty minutes before the doors opened again, Death Eaters filing out. Pansy held her breath as they left, waiting for Weasley to appear. Finally, as the last stragglers left, she appeared around the edge of the door.

She'd scrubbed away some of the dried blood, but rust-brown flakes still clung to her skin here and there. She paused and glanced around, watching the Death Eaters disperse, and then ducked into one of the nearby sitting rooms.

So. Whatever Weasley'd offered up had been convincing enough for the Dark Lord. It wasn't enough for her, though. Weasley was lying. Had to be. And if she was... what if Pansy caught her at it? That was a win she desperately needed. If she could bring the evidence to the Inner Circle... well, she'd never have to worry about her future again. She'd be secure.

Which meant, as little as she liked the idea, that she had to take a few risks.

Weasley had gone into one of the smaller sitting rooms. Pansy was fairly sure that was the one Blaise liked to sit in during the evening, which meant there might actually be something interesting to listen in on, provided he didn't irritate Weasley into leaving. It _also_ meant that if she stood in the storage cupboard behind it and used a sound amplifying charm, she'd be able to hear every word they said without getting caught. She didn't think she'd hear anything _too_ incriminating - if Weasley had made it through facing down the Dark Lord and all the Death Eaters, she probably wouldn't let her guard down in front of Blaise - but you never knew. He had a way of getting under people's skin.

By the time Pansy made it to the cupboard they were already talking, though not about anything interesting, just the usual lazy insults Blaise tossed out when he found himself socialising with somebody he didn't like. Pansy rolled her eyes and transfigured a nearby bucket into a chair; if she had to spend time listening to his bullshit, she wanted at the very least to do it comfortably.

"I wouldn't have thought this was your kind of thing," Weasley said, a mocking edge in her voice. "Aren't you more of the... oh, I don't know, the type that sits around waiting for your servants to think for you? Being a Death Eater will actually require effort, you realise."

"You're a fine one to talk about having servants, Weasley," Blaise drawled.

"Surely you can manage a better comeback than _that_."

"Why would I bother for someone like you, Weasley? Surely you don't think I care that much."

"What, no pride in your own work? Or at all?"

He scoffed. "Don't you understand what I'm saying? It doesn't matter how much _pride_ I have. It isn't worth wasting effort on a blood traitor."

"And here I'd thought that joining the Dark Lord ought to absolve me of that. Or are you just more particular than most?"

"Once a blood traitor, always a blood traitor. If you really thought otherwise, it just goes to show what your lack of breeding's done to you."

"That's rather rude," Weasley said. Her voice was still utterly calm, far calmer than Pansy would have been in her place. "But then, I get the feeling you think that way about most of your classmates, no matter how polite you might be to them in public."

"As if I'd tell you."

"What, really? You haven't ever wanted to say any of that out loud, to somebody who nobody would ever believe was telling the truth if they repeated it?"

Blaise was silent for a moment. Pansy wasn't surprised: it wasn't hard to tell that he _did_ have opinions about the rest of his old classmates, but he was usually too politic to say anything. And if there was one thing she knew about keeping that kind of secret, it was that eventually, the effort of keeping them in started to burn.

"Even if I did," he said finally, "do you really think I'd be stupid enough to insult Death Eaters' sons in their own home? Where anybody could listen in?"

"It's not as though everybody here is a Death Eater's son - though I will admit there are quite a few of them. What about, oh... Parkinson?"

Pansy's stomach sank. She'd seen the way Blaise used to look at her - and he really didn't have any reason to hold back now, her uncle was long dead and none of the other Death Eaters cared that much about her -

"Pansy?" he said, voice full of scorn. "She's just sitting around hoping someone will make the mistake of thinking she's worthy to be here. Or maybe she thinks somebody'll offer to marry her - not that a revolutionary group is the _usual_ sort of place to find a husband, but it's not like she's bright enough to realise that. I suppose she could've gotten herself kicked out of the matchmaker's and picked this as an alternative..."

Pansy tightened her fists, feeling the bite of her nails on her palms. It was better than thinking.

"Oh, come on," Weasley said. Pansy could almost hear the smirk in her voice. "You really think they would've let her in here if she weren't useful for something? This isn't a charity."

"Well, there's always target practise," Blaise said, and laughed. "No, she's got some relative or other - an uncle, maybe? - who was a Death Eater. Got himself killed by the Aurors the last time around, I think. The Dark Lord wants new blood, probably because Potter's done such a spectacular job recruiting for the other side, but I don't think he'd be desperate enough to take her if she didn't have family in already. Though even if she _does_ somehow end up with a Mark, I can't imagine she'll get to do anything useful. There's a hierarchy, after all. She'd be somewhere near the bottom, with Vince and Greg."

Pansy's chest hurt. She wanted to march in there and hex him - or maybe blast out the wall and stride through, _make_ him realise what she was worth -

This was Blaise. Pansy had to remember that. He was a selfish arse who thought the world revolved around him, who thought nobody else was worthy to so much as kiss his feet, especially if - like Pansy had - they'd spent more time fussing over a boyfriend than duelling or trading barbs. Of course he didn't think much of her. That was just like him. He wasn't worth getting upset over.

Pansy still really, really wanted to curse him.

She bit her lip, trying to force the rising bitterness away, but it didn't work: Pansy's mind kept returning to every time Blaise had sneered at her or at someone she liked, every time somebody had looked at her and thought she was less because she liked makeup and short skirts, every time she'd been scoffed at because she clung too tightly to Draco's arm - and every time he'd taken her for granted, and the time he'd dropped her without bothering to explain why, and, and -

Her hand was clenched around her wand. Her gut churned with acid.

The sound of Weasley and Blaise's voices was distant, bees buzzing maliciously around their hive. Unintelligible. Useless.

Pansy cancelled the sound amplifying charm, hand trembling. She was not going to curse Blaise. It wouldn't help anything. She'd just... go up to her room. Hope she didn't run into anyone on the way, because the _last_ thing she needed right now was somebody making a snide remark or sniffing or even just looking at her disapprovingly, _Merlin_ , she just needed to hide somewhere until... something. Until she could be around other people without wanting to hurt them, probably.

The corridors between the cupboard and her room were empty. She wasn't quite sure whether she was glad for it or not.

Pansy sealed the door to her room behind her and stopped in the middle of the room, shaking. How was she supposed to do this? What if every time she tried to listen in on Weasley she ended up finding out something she would've rather not known?

Merlin damn Weasley, anyway. This was all her fault. If she'd never shown up here everything would've been just fine. Pansy could've come up with a way to distinguish herself eventually, she was sure of it, but with Weasley here she didn't have _time_. The Dark Lord would be expecting so much more from all of them, and she _couldn't_ -

Pansy turned and shoved the window open, leaning out into the warm spring darkness. She was too far away from the ground to see what was scurrying around down there, but that didn't matter, really.

" _Accio spider!_ "

Pansy only had to wait a moment before a small fuzzy body slapped into her palm. It lay dazed for a moment, giving her a chance to construct a miniature duelling ring with a flick of her wand and drop the spider inside.

She had to focus. She hated the spider. She wanted to hurt it. She wanted to _watch_ it hurt, squirm on the floor the way Moody had done to the spider he'd cursed in her fourth year. She wanted -

" _Crucio!_ "

The spider continued scurrying without so much as a pause.

She licked her lips. Steadied her trembling wand with her off-hand.

" _Crucio!_ "

Nothing.

"Fuck!"

Pansy hurled her wand at the wall. It bounced off harmlessly, clattering to the floor, and doing absolutely nothing for the formless anger rising up inside her.

It was the spider's fault. Had to be. She didn't hate it enough - who _would_ , honestly, they were just _bugs_. She needed...

She snatched her wand up again, turned to face the spider, narrowed her eyes. Imagined Weasley there, that messy carrotish hair and the smirk and the air of superiority, like there was something she knew that Pansy didn't, like Weasley could do anything she liked and get away with it.

" _Crucio!_ "

Nothing.

Useless. No wonder Weasley looked at her like that - no wonder Blaise agreed with her - Merlin, Pansy couldn't do anything, could she. They'd ask her to show off like Weasley had someday and they'd see how useless she was and then they'd -

She kicked the barrier spell away like so many soap-bubbles and ground her foot down on the spider. There. At least that much of the evidence was gone.

Merlin.

Pansy sank onto her bed, arms wrapped around herself. Her throat ached dully, which might have been more bearable if she hadn't been shaking too. It was ridiculous. Hadn't she been Slytherin's Queen Bee? She'd slapped down any challengers to her title, spat bile at anyone who dared to target her roommates or the younger girls - and, oh, there'd been a lot of them, hadn't there? Far too many people had assumed that a silver-and-green tie meant they were secretly all Death Eaters. Just think how they'd laugh if they saw her now, trembling like a leaf because she couldn't do some ridiculous little spell.

Of course, Pansy probably _would_ see them. They'd be on the other side of the battlefield from her one day, presuming they had the guts for it. Maybe they wouldn't; it was a lot easier to throw prank hexes at firsties than it was to face down someone who'd be willing to kill you. Which, she supposed, was one thing she knew made her better than them. Someday the order to fight would come, and she would do as her Lord commanded. No matter how terrified she might be in the moment. To do otherwise was... unthinkable. It would, in fact, be safer never to even consider it. Better not to give the Dark Lord the idea she might be contemplating _not_ doing as he commanded. He didn't react well to perceived disloyalty.

Pansy wasn't disloyal. She was just... useless. And, in the end, he might see them the same way. What good was she if she couldn't fight his enemies?

Her mother had told her when she was younger that the only way she'd ever have any power was to marry well. Pansy had tried. She'd spent all those years hanging off Draco's arm, giggling at his jokes and snarling at his enemies, and in the end he'd taken the Mark and set her aside. If she'd done a better job at holding his attention maybe she could've held onto him, and maybe gone to him for help - the Dark Lord's attention might be on destroying his enemies _now_ , but he'd need his Death Eaters to marry and make pureblood babies, wouldn't he? She'd be safe like that.

Except that she didn't _want_ to be her mother. She didn't want to spend her life pottering around a manor with nothing to do, or popping out children she could tell horrible things about their best path through life. She wasn't even particularly interested in marrying Draco. Oh, he was a good enough friend when he wasn't burying himself in the war, but she didn't love him, and she was pretty sure it was mutual.

This should have been her chance. She could have been the next Bellatrix Lestrange - saner, obviously, and hopefully without the stint in Azkaban, but... Pansy would bet nobody'd ever told _her_ that her only option was to find a rich pureblood man to marry. Nobody would dare. She could do whatever she wanted.

Of course, _whatever she wanted_ included the ability to cast the Cruciatus Curse.

Fuck.

She needed a new plan. She needed a way to make herself indispensable. She'd keep practising curses, of course - better not to be caught out if she were ever called upon to demonstrate - but there had to be something a little more likely. Something that wouldn't depend on her having a sudden breakthrough.

Why was it so _easy_ for some people? Draco's parents had probably taught him curses as soon as he had his own wand, and she supposed she couldn't blame them for it, but _Weasley?_ How in Merlin's name had she ever learned spells like that? When had she had the chance to practise them without getting caught by her goody-two-shoes family? And why would she bother? She couldn't possibly mean what she'd said. She _had_ to be lying. There was no way she'd ever voluntarily join the Death Eaters. And if Pansy could prove it...

It probably wouldn't be enough to get herself into the Death Eaters' upper echelons - the Dark Lord needed fighters, after all, and she wasn't quite that - but it might be enough to secure her a Mark. Enough to give her time to breathe, time to work out why she couldn't cast Cruciatus and come up with a way to make it work.

Of course, that meant she actually needed proof.

And, considering that Weasley had managed to con her way in here in the first place, that was going to take some effort.

Lying in bed early the next morning, staring at the ceiling, Pansy still wasn't sure what to do about Weasley. It was tempting to just plunge in - follow her around, maybe just accuse her - but she couldn't be careless about this. Weasley's star was on the rise, and Pansy didn't have good enough connections to challenge her openly. She'd have to be sneaky about it.

The best way to start would probably be to come up with a way to get close to Weasley. Play nice. Pansy didn't like the idea, but it wouldn't be the first time she'd had to bite her tongue and smile at someone she hated; Umbridge had been repulsive, but it'd been far better to be on her good side than to end up one of her targets. It was _always_ better to stay on the good side of the powerful.

Of course, this situation was slightly more complicated. Umbridge had walked into Hogwarts without the faintest idea who most of them were, and so she was quite happy to take the sweet smiles Pansy sent her way at face value; Weasley, on the other hand, had probably heard plenty of stories from her brother and his friends about Pansy's clashes with the Gryffindors. Pansy didn't remember every insult she'd thrown their way over the years, but there was a decent chance she'd insulted the entire Weasley family at some point. And even if _this_ Weasley were as unutterably idiotic as her brother, she probably would have noticed the jockeying for position among the not-yet-Marked crowd. If Pansy came up to her and started trying to make friends out of the blue, she'd wonder why.

So Pansy waited. It wasn't hard - well, it _was_ ; now that she had a plan she was eager to start doing something, anything - but she'd always had patience. She could still remember getting annoyed at Draco when they were children and he couldn't ever just sit still and wait... and. Well. Look where that had brought him, and her. Maybe impatience wasn't that bad after all.

It wouldn't work for her, though, she knew that much. And definitely not right now. Better to rein her eagerness in and watch. There'd be a weak point eventually. Maybe Weasley would turn out to be missing her female friends, or Pansy'd find her crying in a back room, or she'd want to know how to get into the locked parts of the library. Something that'd give Pansy an in.

It took a week of pretending she didn't have any interest in Weasley before she came up with an idea. And it'd be a lie to say she'd come up with it, really; she and the other not-yet-Death Eaters had found an empty room to use for a spot of duelling, Theo had hexed her robes to shrink and choke her, and while she was trying to work out how to expand them again she'd caught Weasley looking hastily away from her exposed thighs in much the same way that boys at Hogwarts had when she'd worn a particularly well-fitting robe.

Which was interesting.

Pansy forced the idea away from her attention until they'd finished duelling and retired to clean up before dinner, not willing to risk showing weakness by allowing herself to be distracted during a duel. It was every bit as intriguing when she finally had the attention to spare.

There hadn't been any rumours that Weasley was a witches' witch back at Hogwarts. Quite the opposite: she'd had plenty of boyfriends, and the biggest item of gossip that swirled around her was who she might target next, and whether that boy would be Potter, especially after he started glaring daggers at her latest boyfriend. Pansy doubted that she'd been dating them just as a cover. It'd be far too much work to keep finding new ones to charm when she could just find a wizard in the same boat as she was and play at dating - and, in any case, her side of the war didn't care nearly so much about that sort of thing as the purebloods did. They didn't care about continuing the pureblood lines, after all; her parents would probably be quite happy for her to find a nice girl, if that was what she wanted.

Pansy herself had entertained thoughts along those lines a few times when she was younger. It hadn't gone anywhere. As nice as it was to sneak glances at Daphne's curves or to wander off with Millie to a hidden corner somewhere - just for practise, of course; didn't they have to be ready for the boys they'd date someday? And wouldn't that take quite a _lot_ of practise? - she couldn't ever date a girl for real. The best a good pureblood girl could get with that kind of thing was marrying a nice pureblood boy, having an heir and a spare, and then finding someone to have an affair with. It seemed like a great deal of work, especially when she didn't really mind Draco. He wasn't nearly as pretty as any of the girls she'd sneaked glances at, but he wasn't terrible.

That _did_ put her in a good position to seduce Weasley, though. She'd have to be subtle about it - or play it off as a last hurrah before marriage if she got caught - but maybe she could play Weasley the way she'd played Draco for years. Merlin only knew he could be an idiot if she took her shirt off, and that couldn't just be a male thing, could it? She'd have to make sure to keep her head clear, but she was a Slytherin. She was made for this.

Now all she needed was some idea how to get Weasley's attention.

Something discreet. Something clever. Which of course she was entirely capable of, though once she thought about it Pansy wasn't sure she'd ever had to _do_ subtlety in romance. She hadn't wanted to risk Draco misunderstanding what she was after back when she'd first been trying to attract his attention, so she'd been almost ridiculously blatant, and... well, she just hadn't dated since they'd broken up. Part of it had been that she'd been sure he'd come running back eventually, and she'd wanted to be ready when he did; part of it had been that she'd been _furious_ , and hurt, and the idea of picking up some new boy who'd probably hurt her just as badly in the end had felt like rubbing salt in her wounds.

How did girls flirt, anyway? Just because Pansy was sure Weasley was interested in her didn't mean she knew how to start. It'd be simpler if she could get a more obvious declaration of interest, too; at least then they could avoid the tedious part where Weasley had to pretend she wasn't interested in girls.

So Pansy watched and waited. Weasley duelled with Pansy's old classmates; she browsed the library, full of ancient and very illegal Dark texts; she spent three hours alone with the Dark Lord, leaving Pansy to stalk the length of her room impatiently as she waited for her to re-emerge. Of course it would be good if the Dark Lord discovered her treachery - the sooner she was cast out, the better, after all - but it wouldn't be good for _Pansy_ , not at all. She needed this, Merlin damn it. She couldn't afford for someone else to catch Weasley.

That afternoon, Theo suggested all the Death Eater hangers-on should pile into one of the duelling chambers downstairs and have a free-for-all, or a couple of doubles duels, or something else more interesting than just going one-on-one. His reasoning was that when the Dark Lord called them up and they ended up in a real fight, they'd want some practise - it wasn't as though the Order would be polite enough to fight by duellers' rules, was it?

Pansy had to admit he had a point, though she wasn't at all sure that was the only reason he was doing it. Did he want to train alongside the people he assumed would also take the Mark when he did? Was he just tired of normal duelling? Was this a clever plot to work out which of them, based on combat ability, was the _least_ likely to end up Marked? Still, she didn't have an excuse to get out of it - not unless she wanted them to think she was a coward, or weak, or frightened they'd realise she wasn't a good dueller - so she piled downstairs with the rest of them. 

To her surprise, they weren't the first there: Millie and her brother were leaning against the wall, while a couple of older boys she didn't recognise were expanding the room into a much larger space and setting up barriers scattered around that she supposed were meant to represent trees or buildings. The older wizards didn't spare them much more than a contemptuous glance, but Millie immediately made a beeline for her, smiling.

"Millie! I hadn't expected to see you here. Weren't you helping your father with his business?" Or, more accurately, with his sudden decision to relocate it wholesale to Wizarding Paris. The Bulstrodes had, other than a few cousins, stayed well out of the war last time around; she and Millie hadn't ever discussed her father's feelings towards the Dark Lord, but Pansy suspected he was both more liberal than the average Death Eater and very worried about what his choices two decades ago might mean for the rest of his family now.

"That was the plan," Millie said, smiling crookedly. "But once we actually sat down to do the numbers, he realised Britain was a much more lucrative market. Relocating would have been a poor decision."

The problem with having a public conversation like this was that Pansy couldn't ever know for sure what Millie meant. Had they been threatened? Were the French having their own pureblood uprising inspired by the Dark Lord? Had he simply realised how difficult it would be to protect everyone he cared about from reprisals for his disloyalty? Or maybe the impetus had come from within the family. Maybe one of them had told him he was being an idiot, that the only intelligent choice would be to throw in on the Dark Lord's side and apologise for not doing so sooner. Maybe Millie, though it wasn't as though they'd ever talked about that kind of thing.

"Well, I'm glad to see you. There's far too many boys here," Pansy said, grimacing.

"I won't be staying, Pansy. I'm just here for today. I doubt I'm a good enough dueller to be useful to the cause - and anyway, I'm thinking of getting married."

"You're _what?_ "

"Remember how I used to write Bernard Selwyn?" Millie studied her face for a moment, and then rolled her eyes. "Oh, don't make that face, I know you've met him - the one who went to Beauxbatons, we met him at that party at the Malfoys' the summer after fourth year, when we went out after the adults were too drunk to pay attention and played night-time Quidditch and I broke his arm with the Bludger."

"Him. Right." She hadn't been paying that much attention, except to be annoyed they'd had to call the match off. Millie flying in her fancy robes, Beater's bat in hand and eyes alight, had been a sight to behold.

"Anyway, we ran into him again in Paris, and he was just... nice."

" _Just_ nice?"

Millie snorted. "Given some of the arseholes we went to school with, yes, I'll take a nice boy who pays attention to what I'm talking about and thinks I'm pretty and agrees with me that we shouldn't rush into having children, but we _should_ rush into adopting Kneazles, because what's a home without one?"

"Oh." It hadn't ever quite occurred to Pansy that Millie might get married some day; she'd imagined it for _herself_ , of course, but she'd always assumed Millie would stay herself: stubborn and convinced nobody would ever ask her out, getting into arguments about animal cruelty with anyone who crossed her path, probably adopting more Kneazles than any sane person would. This... "Well, good for you. Someone has to marry the nice boys, after all!"

Millie rolled her eyes. "Just because you think exciting's better than good... You'll change your mind someday."

"I doubt it," Pansy said.

"Don't let stubbornness hold you back! Really, it's... well, nice."

"If you say so."

Millie leaned in closer. "Honestly, though. This seems like it'd be very exciting. Very up your alley. Is it... working out?"

"I haven't impressed anyone enough to get a Mark yet, if that's what you mean. Though it's only a matter of time. I'm sure today will help. Everybody wants to look like a good dueller, after all!"

"Yes." Millie glanced away, lips pressed tightly together, and Pansy flinched.

Pansy hadn't been the best dueller in their dorm. Neither had Millie, or Daphne; that honour had gone to Tracey, the only halfblood in their year. Tracey had probably been better than any of the boys, too. She'd _understood_ it in a way the rest of them never had, moving like lightning, her wand almost seeming to move on its own.

The day they'd stepped off the Hogwarts Express at the end of seventh year, Tracey had told them not to bother contacting her again. She was leaving. It would be safer for all of them if they didn't know where she was going.

Tracey and Pansy had argued about the Death Eaters the night before. Pansy had invited her to stay at her house for the summer, since rumour had it the Dark Lord might be looking for new recruits and she doubted he'd go looking in the Muggle suburbia where Tracey's mother lived. Tracey had said that of _course_ she wouldn't, at a time like this the only reasonable response was to leave, not to sit around at a country estate and wait for trouble. Pansy had tried to point out why she ought to stay - there were other halfbloods in the Dark Lord's service, so it wasn't as though he wouldn't make the offer, and it'd elevate her, really, nobody could say a thing about her blood status if the Dark Lord liked her, and she _would_ be, she could out-duel any of the Slytherins in their year and that was a talent he'd want to have on his side -

Tracey had, very bluntly, told Pansy she had no intention of disavowing her mother. Or of killing Muggles, and _Pansy if you think that's not what they're about - if you're really stupid enough to think this is some noble crusade, because it isn't, all they want to do is_ hurt _people, they'd do it to you if you got in their way no matter how pure your sainted blood is -_

By the time their dorm-mates had come back into the room, Tracey was hidden behind her curtains and Pansy was angrily throwing things into her trunk. They'd heard, of course, but they were polite enough to pretend they hadn't. What was the point in getting involved now, when they were so close to never having to share a room again? The awkwardness had stretched on through the next morning, then onto the train, where they all desperately pretended nothing was wrong for the sake of the boys; and then Tracey was gone. 

Pansy hadn't bothered to try to write her to apologise. If Tracey really wanted to vanish, the obvious first step would be to cast an owl-repelling charm, and anyway she'd still been too furious to come up with a decent-sounding apology. The idea that Tracey had swallowed Dumbledore's propaganda about the Dark Lord in its entirety - that she really _believed_ all that rot about the Death Eaters, that she didn't think that joining him would protect her mother at all - it was ridiculous. She ought to have known better, and it wasn't _Pansy's_ job to coddle her. Once this was all over she'd understand how wrong she'd been, and regret not getting involved early on, but for now... clearly Tracey wasn't interested in actual facts. There wasn't any point in trying to convince her.

"All right!" Theo said loudly. Pansy started and turned to face him. "What do you want, teams or free-for-all?"

"Everyone here's got to have duelled in teams before, right?" said one of the strangers, sneering. "I'd rather do something more interesting."

"Objections?" When nobody spoke, Theo gestured them into the room. "Find a spot and I'll count down to five."

Pansy strode to the back of the room, eyes flicking around. She needed to not look useless here. It'd be _nice_ to win, but it probably wasn't realistic, not when she didn't have any idea what she was doing in this kind of a fight.

Vince and Greg were powerful and good at curses, but they didn't think fast. Theo knew lots of clever little-known spells that'd slip right past a _Protego_ , but tended to panic under pressure. Blaise was overconfident. Millie wasn't confident _enough_ , and tended to hide behind shields in the hope her opponent would wear themselves out. She didn't have any idea how Millie's brother or the others - his friends, maybe? - duelled, but that was probably all right, since they had apparently all decided to cluster around Weasley, who'd set up in the far corner. That was fine by Pansy. She didn't know how Weasley duelled, either, but Pansy had a strong suspicion she'd be good at it. If the older and presumably more experienced duellers wanted to wear themselves out on her, that was their choice.

The big question was who everyone on this side of the room was going to aim for first. Vince and Greg, maybe - they'd spent so much time working as a unit at Hogwarts they probably wouldn't think to hex each other, which would make them the biggest danger. Then Blaise and Theo against each other, probably, since they'd see each other as the next-biggest risk and didn't get along quite well enough that their first instinct would be to team up... could she get Millie to work with her? Would it even be helpful? Maybe, if she didn't mind staying in one place and doing the bulk of the cursing, and if Millie actually stuck with the truce instead of hexing her in the back on the grounds that it was _supposed_ to be a free-for-all and betrayals were expected...

"Is everyone ready?" Theo said loudly. "If you're not, you've got until five, we won't wait for you. One -"

Pansy cast one last look around the room, at Weasley's bright hair behind a loose circle of boys, Vince and Greg not quite back to back but close enough nobody would be surprised, Millie's elbow sticking out from behind a tree-shaped barrier...

"Five!"

Pansy cast her first curse.

"Well," Millie said, brushing herself off. "That was exciting."

"You hid behind a tree the entire time," Pansy said, rolling her eyes. "How exciting could it be?"

"Believe me, I have much more fun watching other people get hexed than getting hexed myself. Oh - you're bleeding."

"Wait, wh- oh." Pansy's collarbone started throbbing dully as the excitement faded, and as she glanced down she realised she was bleeding. "Damn."

"Have you gotten any better at healing spells since the last time we duelled? No? Come here, then." Millie sliced her robe open, baring a wide but shallow wound. "Give me a second."

None of the other duellers seemed to have noticed what they were doing - they were either patching up their own wounds or arguing about which of them had done the best, a discussion which - despite being the actual winner - Weasley seemed to be excluded from. It was a relief. Pansy was sure that Bellatrix Lestrange would be every bit as poised in the nude as she was clothed, but _she_ didn't particularly enjoy the idea of one of her classmates seeing her with a flap of robe fallen away from the top of her breast.

Pansy glanced up and met Weasley's stare, her eyes widening in shock.

Correction: _most_ of the other duellers hadn't noticed what they were doing.

Weasley looked away. Pansy noticed, too late, a blush spreading across her cheeks. It couldn't only be from the duel, could it? Nobody else was that red.

This was what she'd been waiting for.

Pansy had caught her looking. She couldn't deny that. All she had to do was come up with some way to confront Weasley over it, and a way to imply it was mutual, and -

Weasley looked up again, blinked, and raised a brow at her.

Pansy could feel a blush starting, and hated it. She hadn't started the staring, Merlin damn it - Weasley had looked _first_ -

She bit her lip hard, forcing the embarrassment out, and copied the expression, shooting it back to Weasley with a hint of a smirk.

"Pansy? I'm finished."

She started, glancing back at Millie. "Sorry. Lost in thought."

"I'm sure you were. Listen..." Millie drew her to the side of the room, away from the boys boasting about their spellwork. "What exactly are you doing with Weasley?"

"What do you mean?"

"Oh, don't give me that. I saw you looking at her, and it's not like I don't remember what that particular expression means. So?"

Pansy bit her lip. "Look. You can't -"

"It's not like I'm going to be here to tell anyone - and anyway, I know secrets of yours that'd go over worse."

"Not more than this." Pansy glanced at Weasley, who was watching Theo mock-duel Millie's brother with a thoughtful expression on her face. "I don't think she's telling the truth about why she's here."

"And the solution to that is for you to fli- oh. Oh, Pansy, no. This is a bad plan."

"Can you come up with a better one that'll give me some Merlin-damned status around here?" Pansy said, folding her arms.

"No, which is why _I'm_ not staying. But I suppose marrying a nice boy isn't a solution you'd be willing to accept either, so... don't get caught, I suppose."

"I don't plan on it."

"It's not like you planned on getting dumped, either, but here we are." Millie sighed, tipping her head back against the wall. "Anyway - I suppose I don't know whether you're allowed to go wandering around, but you should come visit me sometime. I'll get Bernard to come, you can threaten him with a dire fate if he makes me cry like you did the last time I dated. It'll be fun."

"If you say so." Pansy honestly probably _should_ try to meet him before Millie made any long-term decisions; for all she knew, he might actually be a horrible person, or a liar, or... something. It wouldn't do to let Millie just walk into something like that without somebody poking into his background first. But she was pretty sure that Theo's habit of raiding the manor's wine cellar, and then sneaking out to Diagon to have a bit of fun once they'd sealed the doors, was most of the reason why he hadn't been given the Mark yet even though his father was in the Inner Circle. And she wouldn't get nearly so much leeway from the Dark Lord as he would if somebody noticed her leaving. "I don't know when I'll be able to, though."

"Write me, then. Even if there isn't much you can talk about. I want to make sure you aren't doing anything stupid here all on your own."

"I'm not the one who's thinking of getting married," Pansy said with a sniff.

"Says the one who's angling to take the Dark Mark." Millie paused. "I'll be all right. Honestly. Bernard really is a good person. We're going to visit some of his friends soon - they're thinking of starting a business together, Bernard's got some thoughts about broom design and apparently Stefan's got a head for business and some connections in Paris that'll help. I suppose I'll move there with him once we're married."

"That'll be nice," Pansy managed. It mustn't be that France was getting as dangerous as Britain, then, if she was planning to go back. Good. "And you've got much better French than any of the rest of us."

"It'll make it a lot easier to get along there, yes. And... look, I know you want this, but if that changes - I'm sure I could teach you French if I tried."

Pansy swallowed, feeling a lump in her throat. "It won't. But if, say, I end up on some kind of diplomatic mission to France someday, I promise I'll go to you first for lessons."

"Which wouldn't have anything to do with the fact that you brought your last French-speaking governess to tears, I'm sure."

"Of course not. Clearly the fact that Mother couldn't find any other governesses who spoke it to teach me is an unrelated coincidence." She pressed her shoulder against Millie's, glancing out at the rest of the crowd. Millie's brother was shooting glances their way, clearly quite happy to leave before they could be invited to stay for dinner and a more formal demonstration of their abilities. "I promise I'll be fine."

"I know you'll be fine. This is just... it's a bit bigger than anything you got up to at Hogwarts ever was, that's all."

Pansy wasn't sure what to say to that. So she kept her mouth shut, watching as Millie's brother wriggled out of the crowd of boys and started making what were probably supposed to be significant faces at Millie. Had he been a Slytherin? She couldn't remember. But surely if he had he could've come up with some better method of wordless communication than glaring while frantically waggling his eyebrows.

"I think I have to go," Millie said. "We're expected back for dinner."

"Oh, so soon?" It seemed like a terrible idea to roll her eyes at him, or to give some other indicator that he was being blatantly obvious in a room full of future Death Eaters. Still, she'd see Millie again, wouldn't she? They could have a giggle about it next time they were somewhere private.

"Our parents would worry if we stayed too long," Millie said. "You know how it is."

"Of course." Not really. Pansy's mother cared more about the _appearance_ of her eligible daughter staying out late than anything else, but a few arguments with Tracey in fourth year had suggested to her that wasn't all that usual. "We should try to meet up again someone, though. It's been way too long."

"I know. But... it'll depend."

Pansy shrugged. "Doesn't mean we can't try to plan something. I'll write you, all right?"

"You'd better."

Millie gone, Pansy let herself lean back against the wall and consider. She obviously couldn't just walk up to Weasley; there were too many people over there who might listen in. She needed to speak to her as soon as possible, though - strike while it was still on Weasley's mind - and it'd be easier to do now before Weasley could vanish into her room with a stack of books. Maybe -

Maybe Weasley would come to _her_.

Weasley set herself against the wall next to Pansy, twirling her wand in her fingers. "What was that all about, earlier?"

"I'm sure I don't know what you mean."

"The staring?"

"As if you weren't staring first." Pansy met her eyes. "Don't bother denying it. I saw you."

"Maybe I was wondering how you'd gotten hurt," Weasley said.

"Yes, that really seems like something that'd make you blush. I suppose it might pass as an excuse if I hadn't caught you looking before, but as it is..."

Weasley's brows drew down. "And you aren't backing away in a panic out of fear for your reputation? I'm surprised."

"What makes you think I'd do something like that?"

"I thought all the good Slytherin girls wanted was to find a nice pureblood boy to marry," Weasley murmured, leaning closer. "Aren't you worried about getting caught?"

"You _are_ a pureblood. Unless you've been keeping secrets?" Pansy said, brows raised.

"I don't know that anybody would describe me as _nice_."

"I suppose that's true." Pansy leaned back a little, meeting Weasley's eyes. "But I'm not worried about getting caught, no. Frankly, I'm not sure anybody has enough spare attention to notice us - they _are_ rather busy, after all - and if they did, well. Bellatrix Lestrange's managed to get away with plenty of things good pureblood girls aren't supposed to do because she's a Death Eater. Maybe I'll model myself after her."

"Ambitious."

"Isn't everyone here?"

"That depends whether you're including Crabbe and Goyle."

Pansy snorted. "That just shows you don't know them. I'll grant you neither of them stood out at school, but that's just made them more desperate. They spent seven years overshadowed by Draco, and now suddenly they have an opportunity to step out in front of him because they _do_ have useful skills - wouldn't you jump at the chance in their position?"

"Huh." Weasley looked slightly unsettled. "I hadn't realised."

"Frankly, I wouldn't have expected you to," Pansy said with a shrug. "It's not as though I've ever wondered about the hidden depths of the Gryffindors in your year, though I'm sure they must have them - look at you, after all. I doubt anybody expected you to show up here. I certainly didn't."

"I've gotten that a lot lately."

"Goodness. How surprising."

Weasley rolled her eyes. "Yes, yes. Now, if you don't have anything else to say, I think those idiots over there have just about worked themselves up to challenging me to a rematch..."

"Maybe we can talk again later?"

A grin crossed Weasley's face. "Sure. Sounds good."

Pansy had never been particularly bookish. She studied when she had to - who wanted the embarrassment of failing a class? Not her, that was for sure - but she'd never been one for haunting the library the way some of her yearmates had. It was a habit she would have been quite happy to continue after leaving school. Unfortunately, she still hadn't managed to cast the Cruciatus Curse, and sacrifices had to be made.

Theoretically, the manor's library ought to be much more useful for her purposes than Hogwarts' one would have been. She didn't have to worry about the books she needed being tucked away in the Restricted Section or maybe never even permitted into the castle at all; they were all right here laid out in front of her, centuries' worth of Dark scholarship tucked away neatly on the shelves waiting for somebody to read them. Precisely what she needed.

Practically speaking, though? Pansy was beginning to realise that finding anything _useful_ might be a harder job than she'd thought. The books weren't organised at all, as far as she could tell, and most of them seemed to have been written for somebody with much greater knowledge of the Dark Arts than Pansy possessed. It was a scholar's library, not a student's, and it was beginning to make her worry the information she needed wouldn't be here at all.

Pansy slid yet another book back onto the shelves with a growl. She'd found one about the Unforgiveables this time, at least, but there hadn't been any useful information, just a long and drawn-out argument in favour of reducing the legal penalties for using them. Nothing at all about how she was actually supposed to do it.

Maybe it was a sign. Maybe the Cruciatus Curse was actually easy for most people and the reason Pansy couldn't do it was that there was something wrong with her personally. Some kind of mental block, maybe? Fear of what would happen if she got caught? Which was ridiculous - if there'd been anyone left in the Ministry who'd dare to stand up to the Dark Lord then they would probably have a lot more problems with her choice to follow him than her attempts at the Cruciatus - but that sort of thing didn't always have to be logical, did it? Surely not.

How would she fix something like that? A spell? A potion? Hopefully not some kind of self-reflection - that sounded terribly tedious, not to mention slow. She wanted to deal with this _now_ , Merlin damn it, not however many weeks in the future it took her to figure out whatever was wrong and come up with a way around it.

Pansy tipped another book onto a table and flipped through it. At this point she was having a hard time giving them more than the barest attention; it was hard to focus when she knew, with a sinking feeling in her gut, that her chances of finding what she was looking for were low. Whatever her problem was, it clearly wasn't common enough for a lot of people to have written about it. This really might be something she'd have to solve herself, no matter how much work it took. Ugh.

The door creaked open. Pansy glanced up, mouth already open to deliver a scathing remark to whoever was interrupting her, and froze.

It was Draco.

"Pansy." He stood stock still, eyes wide. Pansy was reminded irresistibly of the unicorn foals she'd met in Care of Magical Creatures. The expression was the same, and the hair... though he was far less innocent.

"Draco." Her voice didn't shake. Good. "What are you doing here? I thought you were supposed - you're bleeding!"

"Not really." Draco hardly seemed to have absorbed what she'd said. "Have you been here all day?"

"Well, I left for lunch, but yes." Pansy frowned at him, wondering if he'd run away if she started walking towards him like he had just after he'd dumped her. She didn't care about him, obviously, but she didn't really want to watch him bleed onto his robes.

"Good. Stay here."

"What?"

"Stay here until everything's calmed down out there," Draco repeated, as if that were a useful statement. 

"How about this," Pansy said, folding her arms. "Explain why you're ordering me around, or I'll walk out that door right in front of you."

He rolled his eyes. "Oh, for -"

"Explain. Or do you think I'd somehow know whatever's worrying you even though I've been here all day?" Pansy twirled her wand in her fingers, glaring at him.

"Fine." Draco dropped onto a chair, shoulders slumped. "I was out with the other Death Eaters - raiding, you know - and... the Lestranges are gone."

"What?" It wasn't hard to guess what he'd meant, but it didn't seem real. Not when he'd said it so casually. "You don't mean they're dead?"

"In one spell. Clearly at least one member of the Order managed to overcome their scruples. Anyway, it's a bit... excited downstairs at the moment. The Dark Lord wasn't expecting to lose three of the Inner Circle in one go. You're better off if you stay out of sight for the moment."

"That seems reasonable enough. Now that you're actually explaining the problem, anyway." There was definitely something wrong with him, though Pansy couldn't have named what. Probably the only reason she could tell at all was because she'd known him for so long. Was he upset his aunt was dead? Glad? Frightened? And, if it was one of the latter two, why?

Not that she cared. Not that she ought to care. But it was a surprisingly hard habit to break.

"Glad to hear you agree with me." Draco glanced around, swallowing. "What were you doing here, anyway? This isn't exactly your kind of place."

"Researching new curses," Pansy said, keeping her voice cool. It was mostly true, not that it was any of his business. "I do need some way to draw the Dark Lord's attention, you know."

"Right. Of course. That is important. But..." His voice trailed off as he dropped his gaze to his feet.

"Are you planning on finishing that sentence any time soon?" Pansy asked, unable to keep the irritation from her voice.

He flushed. "I was just - is this really what you want, Pansy?"

Pansy felt a wave of anger rise up inside her. It wasn't fair - he hadn't been there, after all, but - "What is it with everyone thinking they know better than I do what I ought to do with my life lately? First Millie, and then _you_ \- as if you have any right -"

Draco jerked his hands up, cheeks darkening further. "Sorry! I... this just isn't what I thought it was going to be, you know? My father told me all these stories about the Death Eaters when I was little. I thought I knew what I was getting into. But they were _stories_ , the sort of thing you'd tell a kid. Nothing like reality. I just... I couldn't go back now - not that I _want_ to, obviously, but - I just don't want you to jump into something as life-changing as this without thinking about it first, that's all. Not when you still have the chance to back out if that's what you really wanted."

It was almost funny. Almost. "Draco," Pansy said slowly, "it was too late to go back the moment I stepped into this manor. You do understand that, don't you?"

"Oh. Of course." He was silent for a long moment. "But you do _want_ to become a Death Eater?"

"Of course I do. Why else would l have come here in the first place?"

"That's good, then." He stared down at his hands folded in his lap, hair falling into his eyes.

"Is something wrong? You're acting very strange, Draco."

"I - oh. Sorry. It was... shocking, watching what happened. I suppose it just made me really think about what I'm doing with my life. And what I could've done if things were different. It's funny - there are times I've done something that's changed my life forever and not realised for ages afterwards just how important it was, and sometimes it's utterly, blatantly obvious as soon as it happens. Just one spell, and..."

"Maybe you should go get some sleep?" Pansy suggested. Or see a Healer, but admitting to any kind of weakness while around Death Eaters was a terrible idea. With any luck he'd just turn out to be in some kind of shock from what he'd seen and be back to normal tomorrow morning.

"Yes. Probably. I have a lot to do in the next few days, and I expect it'll go a great deal better if I'm properly rested."

"Because your aunt died?" Pansy winced as soon as she'd said the words, but Draco didn't seem upset.

"Sort of. There's no more Lestranges, you know, so a while back she made me her heir. Probably because I'm the only close cousin who's a Death Eater. It's the kind of thing she'd think was important." He shoved his hands into his pockets, shoulders hunched. "I expect they were putting a lot of money towards the Dark Lord's campaign - not to mention whatever Dark artefacts they'd hidden in there before they went to Azkaban. I'll need to deal with all of that. It's a lot to think about."

"You should definitely go sleep." Pansy shoved at his shoulder gently, remembering with a pang all the times she'd had to do the same at Hogwarts when he'd gotten himself caught up in something stupid and decided it was more important than rest. Like this - did he _really_ think there was anything so important in the Lestrange vaults that the Dark Lord would need him to fetch it immediately? Surely if there was it would've already been removed and set aside in some heavily-warded room here. "Go on. Whatever you came in here to research can wait another day."

"Well..."

"You don't really think you'll be able to do a decent job of whatever it is when you're this tired?"

"Maybe not." Draco shot her a crooked grin, one she hadn't seen for a long time. When had that been... fifth year? Or had Umbridge ruined that too? "You're right. I'll leave you to your research."

"Sure." Pansy watched as he stood and turned to leave, not quite sure whether she wanted to stop him. If she could convince him to give it another try, that would change everything - but he'd _hurt_ her, Merlin damn it, and did she really want to give up earning power of her own to marry someone else's? To marry _him?_ And the idea of being with a woman was haunting her, even if none of it could be true - but. They'd been friends once, hadn't they? Maybe they could have that again, if nothing else. "Draco?"

"Hm?"

"I suppose you'll be in here tomorrow to research whatever it is? I could see if I could help you. I've found enough books that aren't what I'm looking for at this point I wouldn't be surprised if I'd already picked up something you need."

"Maybe." Draco didn't turn to face her. "I might get called away. His Lordship's orders take precedence, after all."

"Of course they do." Pansy bit her lip, halfway to saying something else - but no. She'd said her part; if he'd been missing her the way she'd missed him, it was his turn to reach out. "Good night."

"Good night, Pansy."

Draco didn't show up the next morning.

Weasley knocked on the doorframe of Pansy's room, leaning in. "Want to duel?"

Pansy set her book aside, blinking. "Really?"

"Of course. Don't you want the Mark? Being able to fight is usually a requirement, you know."

Pansy tamped down her irritation. "Of course I know that. I just -" don't usually get invited to the duels. Aren't very good at duelling. Thought you were working your way through the actual threats. "- wasn't expecting the invitation."

"Well, here I am," Weasley said. "Unless you have something better to do?"

"Of course not." Pansy slid a scrap of parchment into her book. It wasn't like it'd been helpful, anyway. "Lead on."

Pansy did her best to keep her expression cool and unworried as they walked down to the duelling area, though her heart was beating so hard she could hardly believe Weasley couldn't hear it. Could she win this? Probably not, in all honesty. She hadn't been able to watch Weasley duel the last time, but she knew she'd fought a few of the other not-quite-Marked, and if any of them had beaten her she was sure they would have shouted it to the rafters - Blaise, especially. Pansy wasn't a _terrible_ dueller, but she certainly wasn't the best in Slytherin, either.

What it would probably come down to was speed and spell choice. Most curses were difficult to cast quickly, because they had complicated incantations or took a lot of power or required the caster to maintain a particular emotional state; it _was_ possible to learn to cast them quickly enough to be worth using in a duel or in battle, but even if Weasley really had been on the Dark Lord's side all along Pansy would be willing to bet she wouldn't have had the chance to practise that kind of duelling with actual curses. If Weasley naturally had a fast reaction time, though, she might be able to make up for that, and given she'd played for the Gryffindor Quidditch team that seemed like a decent bet.

Pansy herself didn't have a particularly large repertoire of curses she'd be willing to use in combat. As far as she was concerned, it was far better to use something she _knew_ she could pull off than to experiment and end up Stunned. And if it turned out she was wrong about Weasley's spell repertoire, those wouldn't be enough to win her the duel.

What she really needed was to be faster than Weasley. Make sure she didn't have the opportunity to take control of the ring.

Though... Boys, Pansy had found, didn't tend to like it if the girl they were interested in outdid them. It'd never been much of a problem for her, since Draco was not only bright but also _much_ more interested in academics than she'd ever been, but it'd plagued one or other of her roommates for what had felt like the entire time they'd been at Hogwarts. Would it be the same with Weasley? It hadn't mattered when it was her and Millie in dark corners, since they'd both known they'd end up married to a good pureblood wizard in the end, but she needed this to look realistic. She needed Weasley to think she wanted her. Maybe it'd be safer to throw the match.

Not that she wanted Weasley to think she was weak, either - that seemed like an excellent way to convince Weasley it'd be safer not to be publicly associated with her, and she couldn't afford that - so she couldn't risk losing by _too_ much, and that might be rather difficult, especially since she'd have to work it out on the fly while dodging curses, and -

"Here we are," Weasley said, closing the door behind them and locking it with a tap of her wand. "Rules?"

"Ah - I usually go until unconsciousness or yield, and nothing you can't heal yourself. That's all right by you?"

"That sounds fine. Unforgivables?"

Pansy blinked. "Not the Avada, obviously, but - you can cast them in combat?"

"Not yet. But I can't imagine I'll ever manage it if I don't practise."

"Maybe next time?" Merlin. What Pansy wouldn't give to have that kind of ability. To not only be able to cast curses that were that difficult, but to casually suggest it was only a matter of time until she could cast them _easily_ \- nothing more complicated than snapping her fingers, flicking her wand down at some victim, screaming for mercy, like a child - like the _children_ , little first years under Crucio and Merlin she had to stop thinking about this, not _now_ -

Weasley was watching her, something in her expression Pansy couldn't name. "Scared? I promise I won't hurt you _too_ much."

Pansy let out a long breath. "Like you could."

"Oh, I don't know. I'm a pretty decent dueller." Weasley twirled her wand through her fingers, smirking. "But really. There's no harm in losing - your housemates can tell you, they've all done it already -"

"What makes you think I'm not better than they are?"

Weasley shrugged. "Maybe because their response to losing was to try to get me to duel another one of them, hoping I'd lose _that_ time, but none of them suggested I should fight you?"

Those bastards. No wonder Weasley had spent so much time duelling - crushing their egos, more like -

"Well, you know what boys are like. They don't enjoy admitting that a woman might be better than them at something. Especially if they've had it rubbed in their faces once already."

"If you say so," Weasley said.

Bugger being political. Pansy was going to _win_.

"I do, actually," Pansy said coolly, backing to the far end of the room. "Are you ready?"

"Sure."

"All right, then. Count of three." With a flick of Weasley's wand, a barely-visible shimmer descended between them, the only concession to ordinary duelling whoever had set this space up had allowed. Pansy held her wand at the ready, watching for the telltale flicker as it broke apart. Three - two -

A curse soared towards her. Pansy stepped aside, letting it ground itself on the reinforced wall, and shot back a Stunner. So, non-verbal curses. Not that much of a surprise, it was the best way to fight by far, but she hadn't seen anything _quite_ that shade of orange before and _that_ meant Weasley had a bigger repertoire of non-verbal spells than she'd expected, which meant - step, _Protego_ , and an off-colour Blood-Freezing curse Weasley blocked easily - that she'd be a hard fight. Not that she hadn't known that, but...

Pansy shot out a Reducto and then another _Protego_ barely in time to block the next curse. Weasley was _good_ at this, Merlin damn it. It was like she knew every spell coming at her in time to decide whether to dodge or shield, and Weasley didn't seem to have any difficulty throwing out non-verbal curses, either. Pansy knew some, of course, but she couldn't just cast them the way Weasley apparently could.

Pansy cast two Stunners in quick succession, hoping she'd catch Weasley with one if she dodged the other, and realised at the last moment she'd left herself open to Weasley's next curse. She leaped to the side and stumbled as a bolt of pain shot up her leg. A moment later Weasley's _Reducto_ hit the wall and exploded, hurling her further away. Pansy scrabbled upright, casting a _Protego_ by sheer instinct and catching Weasley's next two spells on it.

This wasn't working. Pansy just wasn't fast enough. And that wasn't something she could change now: it'd take a serious amount of practise to be able to cast curses with that kind of speed, and Pansy hadn't ever had the inclination until the Dark Lord's invitation came along. The only real thing she could summon up a decent speed with were the spells she'd learned in first and second year, which -

In a flash, Pansy dropped her shield, shot a thick cloud of coloured sparks at Weasley's face and followed up with a Tripping Jinx. It soared through right before Weasley cast her shield, catching the edge of her heel. Not quite a direct hit, but... better.

"Firstie spells?" Weasley called, laughter in her voice. "Really?"

"Call it an experiment!"

Another curse soared at her. Pansy shielded and shot off another two simple jinxes, and a third when Weasley was too distracted to counterattack. Merlin, was this what duelling was supposed to be like? This _easy?_ Of course using spells like this would be pointless in any kind of serious fight, but... being able to cast this fast was a much bigger advantage than she'd realised. Pansy had time to act, not just react. Time to plan. It was great.

They traded spells for another few minutes. After the first few volleys Weasley seemed to get the hang of Pansy's technique and began shifting her own patterns, forcing Pansy to speed up even more to keep up with her. More of Pansy's spells went awry - though, at the very least, some of Weasley's did too. The problem, Pansy realised as her lungs began to ache, would be that Weasley could keep going for much longer than she could. Weasley'd built endurance up by spending plenty of time duelling and playing Quidditch; Pansy hadn't. Sooner or later she'd trip, or cast a shield a little too slowly, or simply not have the power left in her to cast even first-year spells, and she'd be done for.

It'd probably be smarter to give up before it got to that point. But Pansy didn't _want_ to, Merlin damn it. Just because she couldn't win didn't mean she didn't want to try.

Pansy dodged another unfamiliar curse. Would it have been better to block it? Shield spells took magic and concentration, but dodging would probably take more energy overall - especially if Weasley realised she was tired and started using more area-of-effect curses - and she'd have to notice, wouldn't she? Pansy was honestly surprised she hadn't started taking advantage of it yet. Surely Weasley must have noticed her panting for breath?

Pansy recognised a Reducto, almost too late, and dragged up a shield to block it. Weasley had definitely spotted _that_ ; she started casting faster, trying to keep Pansy from retaliating. She dropped the shield and started dodging again, tossing Tripping Jinxes Weasley's way when she had the energy and hoping she could keep out of the way of her curses. If she could just keep going... one more spell. One more curse to dodge. One more -

Pain seared its way along her arm, and she dropped her wand with a gasp. There was blood - a Cutting Curse? Probably, since it didn't look like there was anything else wrong.

"Yield?" Weasley didn't sound as collected as she normally did, but she definitely wasn't as exhausted as Pansy was, either.

"Fine." Pansy was almost tempted to refuse - almost - but she restrained herself. Maybe if she hadn't been so tired... though dealing with the wound on her arm would've been a problem, since she'd never bothered learning to cast left-handed.

Weasley walked over, fixing her tumbled hair with a flick of her wand as she did, and took Pansy's arm. "That was a good duel. Better than any I've had so far here."

"Really?" Pansy winced at her tone - did she really have to sound so _hopeful?_ \- but it couldn't have been helped, not with Weasley's healing charm stinging along the cut at the same moment. She didn't have it in her to dissemble. "I'd gotten the impression you'd been doing a lot of duelling."

Weasley rolled her eyes. "Haven't you fought any of them? They get all caught up in using interesting new curses, slow down because they can't cast them fast enough yet, and then I beat them. At least you tried something different once you realised that wasn't going to work."

"And there I was thinking you disapproved of my firstie spells."

"It wouldn't impress anyone, if that's what you're after," Weasley said. "But if somebody's trying to kill you, who _cares_ what spells you use, you know? As long as they work. And those seemed to."

"I guess so." Pansy nodded to her. "Good duel."

"It really was. We should do it again sometime."

"Sure."

Pansy realised with a jolt that Weasley hadn't let go of her arm yet. She seemed to have come to the realisation at the same moment; she let go with the sort of exaggerated care that only intense self-consciousness could bring on, a blush spreading across her cheeks.

"All healed now."

"Yes." Pansy's mind felt as empty as a mis-tuned wireless. There ought to be something clever she could say - something she could use to tie Weasley to her, to convince her to let Pansy close enough to dig up all her secrets - but all she had was static. "Thanks."

"You're welcome." Weasley licked her lips. "I, ah... I should go."

"Of course. Right." Pansy stepped back and cursed herself for it. Now wasn't the time to be _polite_. She had to seize the moment. Say something, anything at all. A compliment? "You, um... you fight really well. Maybe we could do it again soon?"

"We already agreed to," Weasley pointed out, smiling.

"Oh. Right." Her cheeks were scorching scarlet. Pansy _hated_ looking like an idiot. Still, maybe there was some use to it - maybe it'd come across like she was too distracted by Weasley to remember what she'd said. The blush ought to back that up.

She still hated looking stupid.

"I really do have to go, though," Weasley said. "I'll see you later, all right?" She slipped out with another smile, leaving Pansy to stand there, wand dangling by her side.

Merlin. This had better be worth it. She wasn't sure she could stand remembering doing something that idiotic, otherwise.

Pansy stopped on the landing, staring down at the manor's main hall, and frowned.

There was an unusually large number of Death Eaters in the manor today. There'd usually be more of them out raiding, or - in the case of the ones who'd managed to keep pretending they weren't connected to the Dark Lord - at home keeping up pretences. And none of them were acting normal, either. No striding through the corridors as if they were kings, or glaring at anyone who passed by - no, they were hurrying along, eyes on the floor.

She glanced around for someone she could ask. Someone not a Death Eater, since they might not react well, someone who'd been around enough to know what was happening - even Weasley would do, as much as Pansy didn't want to admit to weakness in front of her. Like - Theo, ha.

She grabbed Theo's sleeve as he hurried past. "Do you have a minute?"

"No." He still stopped, though. "This'd better be quick. It's not a good time to be lurking in the halls."

"What's wrong?" Pansy said, frowning. Whatever it was, it almost seemed to thrum through the air - everyone who passed looked wary and tense, glancing at everyone they passed almost furtively, shoulders tensed as if they expected to receive a blow at any moment.

"You haven't heard?"

"Would I be asking if I had?" she snapped. "Come on, Theo." Whatever it was, it had to be bad. The passing Death Eaters all looked far too grim and nervous for anything to have gone right today.

"Well..." Theo said, glancing down at his hands.

"Are you _serious?_ "

"Look, I don't want to talk about it," he said, glance flickering along the hall. "It's - if anybody finds out we're standing around gossiping about this -"

"Did I or did I not save your sorry arse more times than I can count back at Hogwarts, Theo?"

"Well. Yes. All right. I..." Theo glanced around again, lips pressed together so tightly they were white. "Draco's gone."

"Gone?" Pansy licked her lips. "Do you mean - is he on a mission? I suppose that makes sense. They trust him with more than us, after all, Draco _does_ have the Mark -"

"No," Theo said flatly. " _Gone_. Fled. Done a runner."

Pansy's stomach sank. Was that why... Draco had been so _strange_. So worried about what he'd be asked to do. So concerned with her choice to become a Death Eater - had he been trying to decide whether to ask her along too? Had he meant goodbye when he'd wished her a good night?

"There's a meeting soon," Theo went on, apparently unaware of her distraction . "I - I haven't seen our Lord, but apparently he... isn't happy."

"I suppose he wouldn't be," Pansy said. She felt strangely detached from her body, as though she were floating above it while it nattered on like an enchanted doll. "If Draco left without..."

Theo shook his head. "Nobody knows anything. And - I hadn't talked to him in a few days - have you?"

"I..." Pansy hadn't, not since the library. But that wasn't uncommon these days; he had a purpose here, unlike the rest of them. "No."

"Merlin only knows how long he's been gone, then." Theo shivered. "His father's still here."

"It has to be wrong." She couldn't imagine - "Draco wouldn't have left his parents."

"Really? You can't see _any_ reason Draco would have gone?"

She shook her head. "Not without them."

"Honestly, Pansy. Draco's a selfish bastard who doesn't think about anyone except himself, and you can't keep pretending he isn't just because you've been after him for years. Do you really think he stopped to think for even a second about how this would affect any of _us?_ Because it will, you know it will, he'll expect one of us to know what happened and we _won't_ , and -"

Pansy seized Theo's arm, nails biting in, and he blinked at her. A moment later a door creaked open downstairs and a man's head poked through.

"Ah. Good, found you," he said. After a moment, Pansy realised it was Vince's father, Mr Crabbe.

"You were looking for us?" Theo said, voice cracking.

"His Lordship wants everyone in the hall," he said, jerking a thumb behind him.

"Everyone?" Pansy repeated. The Dark Lord rarely invited those without the Mark to his meetings; mostly it was just the actual Death Eaters. There'd been the one when Weasley showed up, presumably so she could die dramatically in front of them if she'd turned out to be an obvious spy and therefore scare them off taking offers from the enemy, but before that... probably not since Pansy's first day at the manor, when they'd all been corralled in there and told that they might get the honour of taking the Mark if they impressed the Dark Lord enough. _Might_.

"Everyone," Mr Crabbe agreed. "His Lordship has something big to talk about. Have you seen any of the others?"

"Vince and Greg were duelling earlier," Theo said. "They're probably still down there."

"Thanks." Mr Crabbe nodded to them, turning towards the stairs down to the basement.

They watched as he went, waiting until they heard the distant click of a door closing. Then Theo wrenched away from Pansy, slumping against the banister.

"Something big to talk about. Ha. Like any of us don't know."

Pansy slid down the wall to the floor, letting her robes crumple around her. The unsettling feeling of not being in control of her body had faded, leaving dread to curdle in her stomach. She didn't believe Draco would have left her behind deliberately - he wasn't _that_ selfish, really, more impulsive - but there was one thing Theo wasn't wrong about: there was a fairly decent chance they'd be the ones to pay for Draco's choices.

Pansy was loyal. Of course she was. She'd have to keep that in the forefront of her mind when she was in there, because she'd learned over the past few months here that the Dark Lord was given to punishing failures - even minor ones - with the Cruciatus, and the thought of that was almost enough to make her want to follow Draco. She'd never been Cruciated, and watching the Carrows at Hogwarts had been enough to convince her she never wanted to be.

Of course, she wouldn't _actually_ follow Draco. She was loyal. She _was_.

And if she did and got caught, her death would be far more painful than the punishment she might receive today for not having turned Draco in before he'd escaped.

Merlin. If the Death Eaters caught him, she was going to have to watch Draco...

She shook her head hard and glanced up at Theo. "We should probably go."

"He didn't say _when_ they wanted us," Theo said.

"Do you really want to show up late?"

"Well... no. But I don't want to say 'How high?' when I'm told to jump, either."

"I think you're in the wrong place, then." Pansy stood, brushing at her robes. "I'll even go first, if you're that worried about being seen coming in together."

Theo wrinkled his nose but didn't disagree, which was about what Pansy had expected. None of her old classmates wanted to look like they were making alliances among the others, especially if that person hadn't distinguished themselves in the Dark Lord's service. Theo would change his tune if she were Marked, or if she did something else special - like, say, uncovering Weasley's treachery - but for now, they'd walk in separately. Theo would stand behind his father; she'd stand in the back, with the others who weren't closely enough related to another of the Death Eaters to get any kind of special treatment. It was just the way things were.

Pansy was glad she hadn't waited around when she got there; the room was already more than half full, the crowd moving restlessly as she picked her way through. The tension in the air was even worse here, with so many people standing around waiting for the Dark Lord. Pansy was almost glad for the excuse to stand with her back against the wall, well away from the rest of them.

It didn't take long for the few remaining stragglers to arrive. The Dark Lord still hadn't. Maybe that was normal, though. Pansy doubted he liked to sit around waiting for the rest of his followers to arrive, and none of the Death Eaters seemed unnerved by his absence - not any more than they'd been already, anyway.

A sudden silence fell over the crowd. Pansy bit her lip. Normally she might have been tempted to stand on her tiptoes, try to catch a glimpse of him, but right now staying in the background seemed like a much better choice. She didn't want to draw any attention she didn't have to.

There was a quiet rustle of robes as the Death Eaters knelt. Pansy was a beat behind them, and she mentally cursed. She'd _known_ they'd kneel for him - she'd seen it happen the day she'd arrived - and since everyone else had managed to do it more or less in unison, she'd stood out precisely when she needed to avoid it -

"Rise."

Pansy stood again with the rest, not daring to lift her eyes off the floor. Would it be easier to take punishment if she didn't see it coming? Would he be less likely to do it if she looked like she was trying to be respectful?

"For those of you who have not heard," the Dark Lord said, voice soft, "it was discovered this morning that Draco Malfoy had betrayed me by fleeing the Death Eaters. He will be found, and soon. Those who will search for him... you know who you are."

His voice was the only sound in the room, echoing off the ceiling as though he were in a much larger space. Nobody seemed surprised; the rumour mill had clearly already done its job.

"As for those of you who did not report his disappearance sooner... Lucius?"

There was another rustle as the Death Eaters drew away from him. Pansy could see Mr Malfoy clearly; he was standing quite near the Dark Lord's throne, normally a place of honour. Right now, though, it seemed unpleasantly exposed.

"My Lord?"

"You did not notice your son had vanished?" the Dark Lord asked.

"I - no, my Lord. He told me he'd been given a mission - I thought that was why he was gone, that he was obeying your orders."

"I see." There was a long silence. "And you did not suspect he might be a traitor?"

"My Lord." Mr Malfoy's face was white. "Had I the slightest idea my - the boy had that kind of treachery in him - I will find him, I swear it, and when I do -"

" _Crucio!_ "

Mr Malfoy fell to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut, writhing helplessly. The scream coming from his throat barely sounded human. Pansy had to clench her fists in the sides of her robe to keep from covering her face; it had been one thing to watch someone she barely knew being Cruciated, or someone who'd sneered at her like she was a piece of meat he was looking forward to sampling, but Draco's father? The man who'd put up with their antics her whole childhood, who'd chased off the peacocks the time she'd managed to upset them and carried Draco to the Floo in his arms that time he'd fallen off his broom and broken his wrist and put up with her asking endless questions about Paris when they'd just come back from a holiday -

Mr Malfoy meant it. Pansy had to remember that. Mr Malfoy would of _course_ hand Draco over if he caught him. Disobeying the Dark Lord was unthinkable. He'd been following him for longer than Draco had even _existed_. There was no question. No reason to even consider it. Of course he'd obey. They all would.

Finally, Mr Malfoy fell still. Pansy bit the inside of her cheek as someone hauled him off to the side like so much rubbish. He'd displeased the Dark Lord; no matter how close they were, she'd be a fool to show she was upset. Her feelings meant nothing next to Draco's betrayal.

The Dark Lord began speaking again, but she couldn't focus enough to understand what he was saying. Pansy's eyes kept straying back to Draco's father, still crumpled on the floor. Mrs Malfoy wasn't here - not unusual, since she'd never been Marked and spent most of her time keeping up appearances in society so the Dark Lord could take advantage of her connections if they were needed. If Mrs Malfoy had been, would she have tried to help her husband? Heal him, or at the very least draw him out of public view? Or would that just anger the Dark Lord more?

It was probably better that Mrs Malfoy hadn't come. _Obviously_ she would have told the Dark Lord about Draco's treachery if she'd known - she was _loyal_ \- but she'd probably never had the chance, since Draco hardly saw her these days. That wouldn't have meant anything, though, any more than Mr Malfoy's loyalty had.

Hopefully this would be enough for the Dark Lord. Hopefully that was what he was saying - maybe reminding the other Death Eaters to watch for signs of treachery, maybe telling them they needed to find Draco before he could get to the Order and spill all their secrets - but as long as he was finished, Pansy didn't care. That meant not having to watch anyone else she liked getting Cruciated. That was enough for her.

There was a quiet shuffling ahead of her. The Death Eaters were moving to the side. Was someone coming through? But no, there wasn't -

All thought fled as the Dark Lord met her eyes.

"Miss Parkinson."

"Yes, my Lord?" Pansy's voice was too quiet for the echoing hall. He seemed to hear her anyway.

"You and Malfoy are... friends, are you not?"

"Yes, my Lord."

"Did you know he planned to flee?"

"No, my Lord." It was true. Draco hadn't told her anything. But she knew that wouldn't stop what was coming. The truth had never stopped the Carrows back at Hogwarts.

"No idea at all?"

"No, my Lord."

"Perhaps he didn't consider you so much of a friend after all. _Crucio!_ "

There were knives - no, fire - no. Something else. Too much. Too much to think about anything but _it_ , anything but the pain fracturing her mind. There was a coppery taste in her mouth, and was it blood? Or was it just one more part of the spell, or her mind's invention because _surely_ something like this must involve blood, there was no way she could hurt this much and not bleed, she couldn't.

Pansy didn't know how long it had been. Every moment was pain and every instant could have been one or ten or a hundred but it must have been a long time. It must have. If she had to endure this much longer there wouldn't be anything left. If -

Pansy realised, dimly, that she could hear voices. Was it over? Every inch of her body hurt. She couldn't tell.

Someone grabbed her. Pansy flinched at the sudden shocking pain, tried to squirm away, but every motion hurt her even more; she was helpless to keep them from dragging her across the cold tiles. When they let go her arm flopped uselessly to the ground. The cry that came out of her throat was hoarse, tearing its way past flesh that felt abused to the point of breaking.

It must be over. The Death Eaters were clearing her out of the way as they'd done to Draco's father earlier. So they could have a clear space for whatever their next entertainment was.

Merlin.

She should probably try to pull herself together. Get up and put a brave face on things. That was what they'd expect, right? For her to be strong.

On the other hand, Pansy wasn't _actually_ a Death Eater. She was just another hanger-on, someone who hadn't been asked to take the Mark yet and might never be. Would anybody even care if she wasn't tough enough to take Cruciatus the way the actual Death Eaters probably did?

On the _other_ other hand, she needed the Mark. It'd protect her. She'd be safer -

Pansy cried out again, throat throbbing, as the cold floor fell away beneath her.

"Oh, be quiet," a woman said. "I'm just taking you back to your room, nothing to worry about."

It wasn't particularly reassuring. Pansy hadn't considered, up until this point, just how vulnerable she was like this. Anybody could have taken her away - done anything at all to her while she was limp and helpless - and she only had this woman's word that she was taking her to her _own_ room, rather than dumping her in the back garden with the werewolves. Pansy wasn't sure that she'd upset any of the women in the Dark Lord's court enough that they'd do something like that to her, but then, it'd be cleverer not to let her know, wouldn't it? That way she wouldn't realise she might have to protect herself.

Pansy needed to know who was moving her.

Opening her eyes seemed to take a titanic effort, and when Pansy did, she was welcomed by a blinding glare. She was distracted for a moment by the tears she had to blink out of her eyes, but it didn't take her long to realise -

"Weasley?"

"Don't talk. It'll damage your voice," Weasley said.

If it hadn't made sense, Pansy would've been tempted to start shouting at her just to see what she did. She settled for glaring instead as Weasley levitated her down the hallway.

Pansy had given Weasley plenty of reasons to hold a grudge against her at school, even if she'd counterbalanced that by flirting with her here... but even if that hadn't made a difference, she wasn't sure Weasley was cold enough to use this as an opportunity to hurt her. It was true that she'd misjudged Weasley before, but...

She realised abruptly that they'd reached her room. It was good to know she didn't have to defend herself, since she certainly wasn't capable of it. A few moments later, Weasley dropped her on her bed, and Pansy gasped.

"Wait there a moment," Weasley said, apparently unaware that Pansy wasn't the least bit capable of moving at that moment. "I'll get some potions."

The pain echoing through Pansy's body was... well, it was still there. But it wasn't quite as overwhelming as it had been - how long ago? She didn't know. It had eased enough that she could stretch trembling limbs and make an attempt to push herself upright. It was hard going, but the burn in her muscles eased the curse's lingering bite, enough to let her think.

Why had Draco fled? Or, perhaps - why _now?_ Pansy supposed he might have hated being a Death Eater all along and just kept it to himself; he'd kept a lot of secrets from her after he took the Mark, and maybe less of them had been related to his service than she thought. But it would have been much smarter to flee earlier. While they were at school, maybe, or on the way home after seventh year. It wasn't as though his parents were any safer now than they would have been then. No matter when he'd gone, they would have paid in blood for his choice.

Now? Now Draco lived in a well-warded manor house full of Death Eaters. Now there was almost always someone awake who might notice him leaving, and spells to track entry and exit, and house elves watching to make sure none of their guests went unattended. Now he was far deeper in the Dark Lord's service than he'd been at Hogwarts, and would be in far more danger if he was caught.

Now Ginny Weasley was here.

Pansy's pulse was thundering in her ears, but she tried her best to be rational. Maybe there was another spy who'd convinced him to go instead. Maybe Draco had always planned to leave, and he'd just been waiting until he discovered enough information to convince the Order to let him in. Maybe... something else.

But if Weasley _was_ a spy, then it was awfully convenient timing for Draco to run, now of all times. She could have offered him safe passage to the Order if he carried as much information as possible to them. Or even forced him into it - would he have really left his parents behind? It wasn't like she'd shied away from using curses up until now. Maybe Weasley had Imperiused him. Though that might be a step too far for the Order; if its members were anything like Potter and his friends, they'd be much more concerned about morals than the average Death Eater, and almost certainly wouldn't agree to using an Unforgivable for information. Weasley probably would. She was too good at blending in here to have let herself keep that kind of scruple.

Pansy paused, gasping for breath, swimming in pillows but definitely more upright than she'd been. Did the Cruciatus curse always have this kind of effect? She was sure it hadn't been so hard on people when she'd seen it used at Hogwarts. Perhaps she'd been under it for longer than they had? Or maybe she was just weak.

The door swung open again as Weasley re-entered, a softly clinking bag in one hand. "Oh. You're doing better, then."

"I don't feel that way." It seemed like a harmless enough thing to admit, considering Weasley had levitated her up here.

"Well, I expect the Dark Lord's Cruciatus would be stronger than the Carrows'. Are you in much pain still?"

"Yes." Pansy hated the word crossing her lips, but what was the point in lying? Especially since she didn't have any idea how hard it was to recover from the Cruciatus, and Weasley had brought her healing potions. "And weakness, and everything aches like I did something horrible to myself _yesterday_. Does it normally take this long to recover?"

"Hm? It hasn't been that long. Though - I've met a few people whose sense of time gets screwed up after Cruciation."

"Really?" Pansy said, frowning at her.

"Really. It's only been... ten minutes? Maybe? He didn't curse anyone else after you, just told us all to leave so he could talk to the _actual_ Death Eaters."

"If you say so." It sounded like comforting bullshit to Pansy - though, to be fair, Weasley didn't really have a reason to try to comfort her. Flirtation and heated glances didn't equal an actual relationship.

"I was surprised, actually," Weasley went on. "I thought for sure the Dark Lord would go after Crabbe or Goyle - they stuck to Malfoy all the way through Hogwarts, didn't they? Though I suppose one of them might have been the one to notice he'd gone missing in the first place. Or he just thought they'd be more loyal to him than Malfoy."

"Probably that." Or he'd thought they were more useful than Pansy and didn't want to risk them deciding to run after Draco. Or he hadn't wanted to upset their fathers and didn't care about hers. There were lots of reasons he would have gone after her and not them, really.

"Well, anyway." Weasley uncorked a purplish vial and passed it to Pansy. "Here. It should help."

"If this is poison, Weasley, I swear to Merlin I'll come back as a ghost and haunt you."

"Why would I try to poison you?"

"Getting rid of the competition?" Pansy took a gulp of potion; within moments the worst of the pain began to fade, and she slumped back onto the pillows with a sigh. "I presume you want to end up in the Inner Circle someday, and the Dark Lord is only going to accept so many. You'd have to sabotage at least some of the other Death Eaters."

"It seems more efficient to me to get rid of the _existing_ Death Eaters and work on the assumption I've already been impressive enough to attract attention, but I suppose some of the junior lot probably do think that way. Though - no offence - if I were picking somebody who didn't already have a Mark as my biggest competition, it wouldn't be you."

Pansy scowled at her, but said, "Thanks."

"Now that I think about it, though," Weasley added, "you'd be a lot _safer_ to assassinate than some of the others. Can you imagine what Nott would do if his son turned up dead? Probably not worth the risk. On the other hand, if I took out Zabini everybody he's annoyed might just ignore it... choices, choices."

"Like you've got the guts to kill somebody."

"How do you know I don't?" Weasley conjured a chair, sitting down opposite Pansy where she could stare directly into her eyes. "The thing is, Pansy - can I call you Pansy? - it doesn't actually take guts to kill. Oh, cold-blooded murders do, if you aren't determined enough it can be quite easy to talk yourself out of it or to let yourself get eaten up by guilt after the fact, but hot-blooded murders? They're simple. All it takes is the slip of a wand. A spell in a friendly duel cast with just a _little_ too much power behind it. A curse shouted across a battlefield, because when it's kill or be killed most people won't lie down and die. That'll be you someday, you know. You'll take the Dark Mark, just like you keep telling yourself you want, and they'll ask you to walk out and face people you know - classmates, teachers, friends - and kill them. Do _you_ have the guts to kill somebody?"

Pansy licked her lips. Weasley didn't know. She was just guessing - Gryffindors always thought everyone else were cowards - she was making the whole thing up. As if _she_ knew what it was like to kill. Ha. Lying bitch.

... Fuck this.

"You did this. Didn't you."

"I'm sorry?" Weasley said, eyes wide and innocent.

"You talked Draco into running. Everybody was so convinced by your little song and dance they never even considered you might have been involved, but I know better." Pansy bared her teeth.

Weasley kept staring deep into her eyes. It was almost getting creepy. "Should I have left him to die?"

"You're assuming _your_ side's going to win," Pansy said.

Weasley snorted. "Oh, no. That's not what I'm talking about. Draco knew that he'd only been ordered to kill Dumbledore because the Dark Lord thought his failure would be a suitable punishment for the mission his father bungled, and the longer he spent here, the more he resented the Dark Lord and hated everything the Death Eaters stood for. Sooner or later somebody would've found out. What do you think would've happened to him then?"

Pansy shook her head. "How would _you_ know? It's not like he would've told you anything about that. And even if you're right -" and Weasley couldn't be, because Draco would have _told her_ \- "what they'll do when they catch him will be worse."

"It'd be terrible either way. At least he has a chance at escaping like this. Though it took me a very long time to convince him it was worth leaving his parents behind - you'd think he'd resent them for dragging him into this, but apparently not."

" _Some_ people are _loyal_ to their parents."

"Of course they are. I just don't see the point in it if they aren't loyal in return. Should he have thanked them for dragging him into a madman's army? For forcing him to commit murder at the age of sixteen? For taking away any kind of control he could ever have had over his life? I know I wouldn't."

Pansy clamped her lips together, glaring. Weasley ought to know better. She was a _pureblood_. Even if her parents _were_ barely worthy of the name, she should at the very least have understood the importance of filial duty. It didn't matter how hard it'd been on Draco: he had a duty to obey his parents and to support their causes.

"I take it you don't agree?" Weasley asked.

"Of course not!"

"And you've always obeyed your parents? Did they agree that you should join the Death Eaters?"

"Of course they did." For a definition of agreeing that had included sighing, rolled eyes, and Pansy's father muttering that it _would_ be a good idea to have another Parkinson in the Dark Lord's service, and her mother telling her to make sure not to get any scars, because she wouldn't want to have such a terribly dangerous career forever and men wouldn't want to marry her if she were ugly. The whole thing had made her want to scream - but, of course, that wouldn't have helped.

"And they meant it?"

Pansy shot an irritated glance at her. "If you want to say something, Weasley, just do it. Stop dancing around the point."

"I _have_ said it. I just have a hard time believing you genuinely think someone you claim as a friend should have made a bad choice just because his parents did."

"What makes you think it's such a bad idea?"

Weasley stared at her. "Are you _serious?_ "

"Why shouldn't I be?"

"Because you were just tortured? Because you're clearly fighting back your conscience every minute you're here? Because the Dark Lord manipulated a teenager into trying to commit murder?"

Pansy glared at her hands, unable to meet Weasley's eyes. "All right, so maybe the Dark Lord wasn't the best choice of leader. But why shouldn't we try to defend our way of life against invaders?"

"Because if somebody offers to help you defend your culture as long as you'll torture a few kids for him, the only reasonable answer is _no_? And, also, if you can define this wonderful pureblood culture that's being worn away I'd appreciate it, because none of your lot actually seems to have a coherent argument one way or the other. Just mumbling about how it's definitely being infringed upon by the Mudblood hordes, woe is us."

Pansy pressed her lips together.

"No? Nothing to say? How predictable. Come _on_ , Parkinson. Stop and think for yourself for once. Do you really want to spend the rest of your life bowing to a madman who hurts kids for fun? I know you don't. You've been lying to yourself for years, the same way Draco was. Haven't you ever wanted to tell the truth?"

Pansy's fingers clenched in her robes. How dare she? How _could_ she? "Fuck you."

"And there I was thinking you were only saying that so you could spy on me."

Pansy's head jerked up and she glared at Weasley. "You -"

"Yes, I knew. Yes, I let you do it. No, the whole thing wasn't a ploy on my part to let you get close enough to convince you to turn on the Death Eaters. That's just a happy accident." Weasley paused. "So? Are you in or out?"

"Fuck you." Pansy sighed and dragged a hand down her face. Everything still ached dully. Had the Carrows known what this felt like? They must have. And they'd done it to children, over and over again. "Fine. I'm in."

"Good. Any questions?"

Pansy blinked. "Is that seriously all you have to say?"

Weasley sighed. "You've just been tortured. You, unlike Draco, don't have a position that lends itself to collecting useful information. What do you _think_ I should be asking you? Frankly, a memory of your decision to join me is all I really _needed_ , since that gives you some good reasons not to change your mind later and dob me in."

"Oh. Okay." Pansy swallowed. She hadn't thought of that, though she supposed it'd make sense for Weasley to be worried she might turn her in. "I... all that stuff you told the Dark Lord that first day about why you were joining up. Was any of it true?"

"A lot of it was. I just... adjusted things. It's true that I learned a lot from the memories in the diary, but they did a better job convincing me that the Dark Lord had taken advantage of Pureblood bigotry to build himself a power base than that I ought to join him."

"Oh." Pansy wasn't sure she agreed with that. Surely nobody would start a war _just_ for power - the Dark Lord must have agreed with them to start with, surely? - but she couldn't say Weasley was wrong, because it had gotten him precisely that, hadn't it? It would have taken the Dark Lord years of effort and networking to get a high position in the Ministry, and that might not even be as good, not if what he really wanted was control over the entire country.

"And the curses, of course," Weasley went on. "I would have had a much harder job convincing the Death Eaters I was really on their side if I hadn't been able to use Dark spells as effectively as I can. I spent a lot of time practising before I came, which helped, but I'd already picked up a lot of useful curses and theory from his memories."

"Right." Pansy licked her lips. "Can I ask you something?"

"You can ask. I'm not promising I'll answer."

Pansy had to hold back a scowl at that - shouldn't Weasley trust her now? It made sense, of course it did, she needed to protect her friends in the Order and it wasn't like she knew what Pansy was going to ask her, but all the same... "I don't know for sure - nobody'll talk about it - but can You- the Dark Lord, is he a Legilimens? Not that I know what that means, really, but I read something about it at Hogwarts years ago and sometimes I feel something strange when he meets my eyes, and..."

"He is."

"Then how in Merlin's name do you keep lying to him?"

"Oh, that's his fault, of course," Weasley said, a smug expression crossing her face. "The memories the Dark Lord left in that diary included his experience teaching himself Occlumency, the art of defending one's mind against intrusion, and experimenting with Legilimency. He was a natural at it, I think. After I out from under the diary's influence I kept getting flashes from other people's minds, so I had to learn to control it one way or another."

Pansy licked her lips. "Do you think you could teach me?"

"I could try," Weasley said thoughtfully. "I taught - someone. He noticed how upset I was and decided to help me out by learning Occlumency, since we thought that'd be the easiest way to keep my mind inside my own head. Of course, that mostly involved Legilimising him repeatedly until he worked out how to keep me out, which neither of us really enjoyed."

"I don't care if it's awful," Pansy said. "I - you mustn't know what it's like, if you can keep him out, but - I've been here for so long, and every time he _looks_ at me - and I have to spend so much time thinking things I don't believe and hoping he can't tell I'm lying to myself, because if he _can_ \- except that didn't work. Did it."

"No." Weasley watched her silently for a moment. "I suppose it doesn't mean much, but I didn't think he'd go after you. I _hoped_ he'd target Lucius, but not you."

"Sure. Because it doesn't play into your plans at all for me to admit I can't stand it here."

"You're terribly cynical."

"Spending a year in a madman's private army will do that to you." Pansy met Weasley's eyes. "Can we start the Occlumency practise now?"

"You aren't in the best shape for it."

"I don't care. The sooner I can keep him out..."

Weasley snorted. "That I can understand. Fine, then. Sit up and face me. I need you to imagine a barrier around your mind, an unbreakable one. I'm going to try to break through, and you need to pay enough attention to work out what the weak points are so you can shore them up. Got it?"

"I think so." Pansy couldn't help a flutter of uncertainty as she met her eyes, but she squashed it ruthlessly. She _was_ going to manage this. She had to.

After all, if anybody found out what she knew now, they'd both die.

" _Legilimens_."

Things changed after that.

There weren't any more meetings for a while - at least, not any that Pansy was required to attend. The rumours swirling around the younger un-Marked set suggested that most of the Death Eaters the Dark Lord trusted were out searching for Draco, hoping to catch him before he could find a member of the Order who'd take him in and spill every secret he'd been privy to. 

Pansy doubted they'd manage it; Weasley - or Ginny, as she'd started to think of her, since it felt ridiculous to continue calling her by her last name after Ginny had recruited her as a spy - had been too cautious about the whole thing to risk letting him go without an exit plan and a contact who could pick him up as quickly as possible. Pansy wasn't sorry, though. The more time the Death Eaters were distracted, the more time she had to build the barriers around her mind.

Not that they spent much time practising. Ginny would pop by every day or so, shatter Pansy's shields with ruthless efficiency, point out where she'd gone wrong, and then vanish again. Pansy was fairly sure she spent some of her time ingratiating herself with any Death Eaters who happened to be at the manor, and probably some of it scouting anyone else who might turn on the Dark Lord, and... what else? Weasley had to have another reason to be here, something beyond just gathering information and weakening his ranks. Why send someone who everybody knew had a close connection to Potter if they could choose anyone else?

Because what Weasley was looking for was dangerous, maybe, or something only a few people were trusted to know about. Or maybe her mission was so sensitive it could only be entrusted to someone who was a good enough Occlumens to hold against the Dark Lord himself, no matter how unlikely a Death Eater recruit she might have seemed.

Pansy didn't ask. That was just one more thing she'd have to hide - and anyway, she was pretty sure Ginny didn't trust her enough for that. She just tucked her suspicions away in the best-protected corner of her mind and spent every other free moment practising Occlumency.

Sometimes Pansy couldn't get away with hiding in her room, and was hauled out for duelling practise or socialisation or the like. When that happened, Pansy would pretend she was a spy - a nameless, faceless spy, because she didn't trust there wouldn't be any other Legilimens around - and imagine she'd been tasked with finding potential double agents. 

How would someone turn Theo Nott, theoretically speaking? _Would_ he turn? What about Blaise, who'd always been so noncommittal about joining up when they'd been in school but had still followed the rest of them here? Pansy would bet he was an Occlumens, looking at those eyes as emotionless as a stone; what was he hiding? Did Blaise really support the Dark Lord, or was he as ready to run as Draco had been? Or was he simply here because he hated Muggles and saw the Dark Lord as the lesser of two evils?

Which was a problem all its own. Pansy's parents had taught her, like every other pureblood child she'd known, that Muggles were horrible and dangerous and inclined towards murder at the slightest hint of magic. Ginny, presumably, had learned the opposite. Pansy didn't _think_ she'd refuse to help her or anyone else because she hadn't immediately started believing Muggles were actually every bit as good as she was - Weasley would have a hard time finding people she could convert away from the Death Eaters if she planned on being that picky - but she wasn't sure the rest of the Order would agree. Ginny might be pragmatic, but Pansy remembered the rest of her family being much more idealistic.

Maybe it wouldn't matter. Pansy doubted Ginny planned on sending her off to them right now, not when she could be more useful here... and as much as Pansy wanted to get away from the Dark Lord, she didn't have a decent way of forcing Ginny's hand that wouldn't end with one or both of them dead. It wasn't likely she'd come face to face with any of Ginny's allies until after the war was over, really - assuming they both lived that long.

The idea that she might _not_ live that long should have been frightening. It had been, for a long time. Once the Carrows came to Hogwarts, once she'd really understood for the first time what the Death Eaters being in charge meant, she'd done everything she could not to end up a victim: she'd stood back and watched while they tortured children, spoken propaganda that felt less and less true with every repetition, buried every disloyal thought so deeply even she couldn't find them. The thought of stopping that pretence had been terrifying, because it meant she'd pay for it.

Instead, Pansy was just relieved.

Maybe she'd die. But it wasn't like that was avoidable, not without doing whatever the Dark Lord had to bring himself back from the dead, and at least if she did she'd go honestly. No more lying. If the Dark Lord pulled Pansy up in front of his followers to die slowly, she'd make sure he knew exactly what she thought of him before she went.

That was what Pansy told herself, anyway. If it actually happened, she'd probably be too scared to make a production of it the way a Gryffindor would. But the thought helped in those moments when she stared up at the canopy of her bed in the dark, caught in endless spinning thoughts of her impending death. Anything was better than that.

It was easier during the day. Pansy could duel, or practise curses by herself, or bury herself in the library researching new ones. Her mind didn't keep generating potential failures when she had a way to distract herself.

She duelled Theo alone a few times, and spent every one on the verge of asking him about his loyalties. He'd been as worried as her the day Draco had vanished. Did Theo think the same things? Would he join her and Ginny if she asked, or would he turn them in hoping to buy his own safety? Could she drip enough poison in his ear to make him hesitate to take the Mark, and save another one of her classmates from death or Azkaban, or would that backfire?

No. Safer to leave the talking to Ginny. If nothing else, Ginny had the opportunity to creep about in his mind - assuming Theo didn't know Occlumency, anyway - and therefore a much better chance of not ruining everything if he turned out to be more enthusiastic about the Dark Lord than Pansy had realised. It was frustrating, though. Pansy wanted to _do_ something.

It was after dark one evening when Ginny showed up at her door, a streak of dried blood on her cheek and an intense expression in her eyes.

"Is something wrong?" Pansy asked as she let her in.

"No. I just need your help with something."

"Oh?"

"I need to sit around in here for a while to do some weird magic, and for you to keep anyone who comes looking for me out. Tell them I'm asleep. If they insist on speaking to me, don't let them in - come and shake my shoulders, I'll come out of it, just don't let them see me. All right?"

"What are you doing?" Pansy asked, frowning.

Ginny flashed a grin at her. "I'll tell you later. I need to stick to my schedule right now."

Pansy wanted to argue - what in Merlin's name could Ginny need to do in Pansy's bedroom with timing that tight? - but she bit her tongue, instead watching as Ginny settled on the floor, eyes closed, breathing even. If she'd lain on the bed she would have done a much better impression of somebody she was actually sleeping, but maybe that was the problem. Too easy to actually fall asleep.

Time seemed to stretch interminably as Pansy stood there staring at Ginny. There was probably something better she could be doing - shoring up her Occlumency barriers? Practising curses? Trying to work out if there was anybody else here who might turn if the right leverage were applied? - but she couldn't bring herself to leave. It was one part curiosity and one part concern; whatever Ginny was doing didn't resemble any magic she was familiar with, which meant it might go horribly wrong. There might not be much she could do if it _did_ , given she had no idea what was going on, but just walking away didn't feel right.

Honestly. Pansy was getting soft. There was a time she wouldn't have flinched at something like this, whether the person doing the strange magic was a friend or not. Ginny had chosen her risks, after all. She ought to know what she was getting into.

There was also a time when she'd thought the Dark Lord coming back would be wonderful, and putting someone with the right ideas in charge of Hogwarts excellent, and punishing the blood traitors she'd gone to school with no more than they deserved. If only she'd known what that would really look like.

Pansy shook her head sharply, as if that would be enough to dislodge memories of children crying out under curses they'd done nothing to earn, and then dropped onto the edge of the bed. This was pointless. She had no idea when Ginny would finish whatever it was she was doing, and standing here staring at her clearly wasn't doing anything good for her mental state. She needed to find something better to do.

Maybe she ought to practise her Occlumency after all. It wasn't like she'd get any better on her own, and frankly Pansy needed to; it'd taken longer recently for Ginny to break through into her unguarded thoughts, but she always managed it in the end. Ginny's response when that happened was always to remind Pansy that she was doing surprisingly well considering how little time she'd been learning, but under the circumstances, Pansy didn't consider that to be good enough. Not if they were both going to survive.

Pansy leaned against the wall and closed her eyes, focusing on her barriers. She wouldn't be able to do any really deep work today - not when she had to stay aware enough to notice and mislead anyone who came looking for Ginny - but it was good to polish up the outer layers every so often too. Make sure they'd stand up to any casual inspection that came their way, fooling anyone who looked into thinking she wasn't hiding anything at all.

"Pansy?"

Pansy jerked upright. "I - oh. You're finished."

"I hope you weren't asleep?"

Pansy glared half-heartedly at Ginny. "You know I wasn't. Are you going to explain now?"

"Sure." Ginny smirked. "Long-distance Legilimency."

Pansy stared. "You can _do_ that? I thought - doesn't it need a spell, or -"

"Normally you need eye contact or the spell, yes. Or... the Dark Mark might work in the same way, actually. It wouldn't surprise me if the Dark Lord could use Legilimency through it, or if he had. He spends too much time punishing the Death Eaters for perceived disloyalty or failure not to have considered it." Ginny leaned forwards, meeting her eyes. "This isn't something he could use against you."

"You're sure?"

Ginny nodded. "It took a lot of time and effort for me to come up with a way to use Legilimency over distance. It'd be a fantastic way to pass information if it weren't so obvious to anyone who walked in that I'm doing something weird. Frankly, I wouldn't have done it today if I'd had the choice, but the people I was contacting haven't managed to come up with a decent excuse to meet in person to do the contact spell, and they've both got far too many eyes on them to sneak away."

"Oh." What would Ginny have done if she hadn't had Pansy? The idea warmed her, a little; it was nice to feel like she was doing _something_ useful. "Could you perform the spell _through_ Legilimency?"

"It's been suggested. But if it didn't work... would it just fail? Or would it cause some sort of obvious or horrible side effect? We don't know, and none of us can risk getting caught."

"Right. Fair enough." The idea of being caught by the Dark Lord was enough to make Pansy feel ill, and incredibly glad that Ginny had recruited her. Looking back, she'd been teetering so close to the edge of rebellion; what if one day he'd realised her façade of loyalty was just that and broken through into the terror and anger and resentment beneath? It didn't bear thinking about. "Did you get everything you needed done?"

"Oh, yes," Ginny said, a fierce grin crossing her face. "They won't know what's hit them when the final battle rolls around."

"Good." Pansy wasn't quite sure how she felt about fighting the Death Eaters in a specific sense - she was fairly sure that if things ever got really desperate they'd start pulling in the ones that hadn't been Marked yet, and she really, really didn't want to come face-to-face with someone she'd spent years at school with - but generally speaking, the idea that Weasley was making sure they'd be outnumbered was a good one. The worse it was for them, the more likely it was she wouldn't be _asked_ to fight the Death Eaters, after all.

"Do you want me to help you with your Occlumency?"

"I - sure. I want to _know_ it's strong enough. But -" She bit her lip. "The people you were talking to - do they know what's happened to Draco? Do you know if he's safe?"

"He is," Ginny said, voice low. "They told me just now. Draco's at a safehouse one of them is running. I don't think he had a particularly pleasant time getting there, but he made it more or less unharmed, and he's helping the Order now - though I can't tell you what he's doing. That _absolutely_ needs to stay a secret."

"Oh. Good." Pansy could almost feel the tension run out of her shoulders. Not that she ought to be so relieved that Draco was all right - he'd left her here, he'd left his parents and his friends and she'd been _tortured_ , but -

"I doubt you'll see him again until this is all over," Ginny added. "I'd like it if Draco fought with us, but I don't know if he'd agree to go up against the other Death Eaters, and I don't know if the Order would agree to let him. He may well spend the rest of the war sitting in a safehouse digging through his memories for any remotely useful information he might have come across while he was here."

"Better than staying here," Pansy said. Something was tickling at the edge of her awareness, something Ginny had said... "Do you think it'll be a long time? Until the end of the war, I mean?"

Ginny stared at her for a long moment, expressionless. "Do _you?_ "

"I'm not the one with connections here."

"True." Ginny sighed once, short and sharp. "No. I don't."

"Oh. Good." Pansy licked her lips. "Do you think we'll _win?_ "

"If I've got anything to do with it, we will. Now, come on - we need to be absolutely sure your Occlumency will stand up to anything Tom can throw at it."

The next week seemed to crawl by. It was close. Pansy would be able to leave soon - maybe leave to fight, but at this point she'd be quite happy to face down a Death Eater or two if it meant the end of the spying, the end of creeping dread that she might be caught at any moment - 

Though, Pansy had to admit, this wasn't quite what she'd thought being a spy would be like. She hadn't done anything. She'd learned to keep secrets, and she'd passed her observations about her old classmates on to Ginny in case she was still recruiting, but... no sabotage? No listening at doors? It felt almost anticlimactic.

She hadn't told Ginny that, of course. She didn't really want to give her the idea that she _wanted_ to be doing any of that; it seemed like an excellent way to get caught. Though Ginny had presumably been doing actual spying and hadn't been caught yet, so maybe it wasn't so bad? Unless she'd come up with some better way to do it - and, come to think of it, she _had_. Wasn't convincing Draco to run the very definition of sabotage? It'd upset the Death Eaters, led to Pansy's own defection, destabilised the Inner Circle's power structures - and that was assuming Draco hadn't performed any sabotage of his own on the way out. And he must have, surely. Even if he hadn't struck the fatal blow himself, the Order wouldn't have let someone so involved in Dumbledore's death into _their_ circles without a good reason.

Despite knowing all that, Pansy couldn't help but wonder when her time was coming. Surely Ginny would need her for something eventually, even if it was something as mundane as help escaping once she'd finished whatever her mission here was. So she had to be ready: well rested, wand by her side at all times, prepared to curse if the situation called for it.

And finally the knock came. It was soft, to the point that Pansy almost didn't hear it; and when she opened the door, Ginny's face was tight with tension.

"What's wrong?" It wasn't that Ginny coming to Pansy's door was terribly unusual by now, but she didn't usually knock so quietly. It felt almost like she was trying to be discreet.

"Listen," Ginny said quietly. "The Dark Lord is going to get a warning very soon that will convince him to leave the manor and take all his Death Eaters with him. I need you to go to him right now and tell him I'm a spy."

"What? I -"

"I will make my way out of the manor," Ginny continued, "taking out as many Death Eaters as I can on my way. Once you've betrayed me the Dark Lord will trust you. I need you to stay near him until he's past the anti-Disapparition wards and is reasonably distracted, and then kill his snake and run. If the Dark Lord leaves the snake behind or sends it away with someone else, come up with an excuse to stay near it or slip away when he's distracted and go back. If you make it out, meet me at Hogwarts. Got it?"

"The snake?" Pansy said, not quite sure what was happening. "Is it really that important?"

"Vital. It's one of the reasons I came here in the first place."

"Right." She licked suddenly dry lips. "I don't think I could use the Killing Curse, though. I haven't even managed the Cruciatus Curse."

Ginny shrugged. "Use a Cutting Curse. If that doesn't work - here." She handed Pansy a soft, warm bundle; after a moment she realised it was a potions vial wrapped in charmed insulation cloths. Fierce orange light glared out through the gaps between the top of the cloth and the wax seal, along with a burning heat.

"What is it?" Pansy asked.

"It's a potions-based Fiendfyre - oh, don't look like that. As long as the cloth's wrapped around it it's unbreakable. Slip it out, throw it at the snake, and _run_."

"Oh, I will," Pansy said fervently. She did _not_ want to keep it on her. Or be near it. At all. "Is this really necessary?"

"The snake isn't the only thing of the Dark Lord's we've had to destroy," Ginny said slowly. She seemed like she was choosing her words very carefully. "Most of the others have needed some... excessive methods of destruction. I'm not sure if it'll apply in this case, since the snake's alive and that'll affect the protective spells he could lay on her, but this is the only chance we're likely to get. I would much rather be safe than sorry."

"I'm not sure that carrying Fiendfyre on me counts as being safe," Pansy muttered, but tucked it into her pocket anyway. Maybe there'd be a miniature potions carrying-case lying around somewhere in the house she could borrow. Not that it'd be enough to protect her if the potion leaked, but at the very least it'd make her feel like the vial was less likely to crack. After all, who knew whether the person who'd spelled the insulation cloths had actually done a decent job?

Ginny almost seemed to slump in relief as she watched her take the potion. That, more than anything she'd said, convinced Pansy this was really it.

"You'll be able to get away safely?"

"As safely as I can when I'm running away to fight in a different part of the same war," Ginny said. "And it's not like I don't have experience with this kind of thing."

Pansy shrugged, the motion short and sharp. "I'd rather wait until you've left the house to tell him."

Ginny shook her head. "We need to get the Dark Lord as off-balance and distracted as possible so you can kill the snake and get away afterwards, and so he's upset enough that he doesn't realise we're leading him into a trap. It'll be easier to manage if he's already had to deal with mayhem in the house."

"I know." She didn't, really. Pansy'd never been good at chess. But Ginny gave off an air of intense confidence, like all of this had been planned months in advance - though it _couldn't_ have been, because how could she have known she'd be able to recruit Pansy? Or Draco? - and, in the face of that, she couldn't argue.

"All right." Ginny strode to the other side of the room, hands locked behind her, shoulders tense. "All right. I - you should go now."

"Now?"

She nodded sharply. "The sooner we start, the sooner this'll all be over."

"Over?" Pansy echoed. "This isn't just another plot?"

A half-smile flitted across Ginny's face. "No. If this works out - and it should, since the Dark Lord would never abandon the kind of bait we're laying in front of him - this will mean the end of the war. One way or another."

"Oh." Pansy's stomach twisted. That probably meant she was going to end up in the middle of a fight; Ginny was good, but there was no way she'd be able to kill all the Death Eaters on her way out of the manor, and if it turned into a serious fight the Dark Lord would probably call in the Snatchers and the werewolves and any other allies he might have made. And Pansy was a better dueller than she'd been before, she _was_ , but that didn't mean she could stand up against that kind of army. She might not make it out alive.

"Are you all right?" Ginny asked.

"I - of course," Pansy said, trying not to grimace. She'd thought she was a better liar than that; the fact that Ginny'd managed to pick up on her nerves that easily didn't bode well. "I just... hadn't expected this to happen so soon."

"I know it hasn't felt like we were doing much," Ginny said. "But we really have. And the job you have today - well, I won't lie and say it's the most important, there's a lot of moving parts here, but if we don't kill the snake there's no point in any of the rest of it. Especially since if you fail he'll know what we're doing, and he might not let us manoeuvre him into a situation where we'll be able to kill him."

"You aren't making me feel any better."

"Sorry. Just... I know I haven't told you much about what's going on, but just know that what you're doing is important. All right?" Ginny strode back across the room, stopping uncomfortably close to Pansy.

"I - yes. Thank you. For telling me." Ginny had even more freckles than Pansy had realised. When had she had the chance to get them? They spent a lot of time inside. Surely they couldn't be left over from before she'd arrived?

They stared at one another for a moment. Pansy felt like her mind was dragging through honey. She probably ought to go tell the Dark Lord - there might be a time limit here, after all, if something was going to make him leave the manor - but just walking away didn't feel right. Ginny might die. _Pansy_ might die.

Ginny licked her lips. Pansy's eyes followed the motion of her tongue without any intervention from her brain, and oh. Right. _That_ was why she felt like this.

Bad idea. Terrible idea, really. They were both about to do very dangerous things, the last thing they needed was some kind of distraction. And yet...

Pansy leaned forwards, watching Ginny watch her and understand and not back away. Felt her breath warm against her cheek, and her mouth, and -

It was barely a kiss. No more than the brush of skin against skin. It shouldn't have meant anything. But it was so _warm_ , heat spreading from Pansy's lips to her cheeks and through the rest of her body, thrilling along her nerves and down into her very core. 

"For luck." Pansy's voice came out a whisper.

Ginny cleared her throat. "Yes. For luck. I... I'll see you later. Afterwards. All right?" She turned and darted out of the room without another look.

Pansy fell back against her bed, blowing out a breath. Soon she'd need to go before the Dark Lord and lie like she'd never lied before. Right now, though, she wanted just one moment to enjoy this memory - because if there was one thing she couldn't let him see, it was definitely this.

Merlin.

Pansy paused by the door of the almost empty hall, staring out at the expanse she'd have to walk through to get to the far end where the Dark Lord lounged on his throne. It wasn't that long - really, it wasn't - but it felt like it would be. Would she even be allowed to walk up to him? There were a cluster of Death Eaters off to one side around a table, and others scattered throughout the room; would they stop her? What if she said she needed to speak to him and they refused even to consider it?

Pansy had to try. This was important; Ginny had told her so. So she'd go.

She took a deep breath, sank all thoughts of Ginny behind her Occlumency, and stepped into the room.

Nobody stopped her, though she spent the walk uncomfortably aware of the eyes on her - not least the Dark Lord's, who had been watching her with an idle curiosity from the moment she'd entered. The scrutiny grew more pointed with every step she took towards him. By the time she'd reached his throne, none of the Death Eaters were so much as pretending to pay attention to the maps they'd had spread over their table.

"My Lord." Pansy was dimly aware her voice was shaking. That was probably okay; wouldn't anyone's? "I - I would like to speak to you. If I can. I have important information."

"Oh?" There was amusement in his voice. "Go on."

"I - I've been watching the Weasley girl. I was afraid she might be planning to betray you, and I - she is. I found proof."

"She what?"

The amusement had drained out of his voice: it was completely emotionless, and the Dark Lord sounded even more terrifying for it. Pansy licked dry lips.

"I'm sorry, my Lord - if I'd known sooner - but I wanted proof, I didn't want to accuse her if she really wanted to help us -"

The Dark Lord seized her head in one cold hand, wrenching it up so he could meet her eyes, and Pansy let carefully-selected memories leak past her Occlumency barriers for him: watching Ginny as she killed the Muggle, asking her for help with duelling, a shame-tinged moment when she'd found her face far too close to Ginny's, and one memory staged this morning in which Ginny had offered to help her escape as she'd helped Draco -

"Where is she?" he asked, releasing Pansy.

"Upstairs, my Lord. I - I did tell Weasley that I would join her - she's a better dueller than I am, and I feared if I refused outright she'd kill me and run, so I thought it'd be better if you could catch -"

"Enough," he said. "You have done well. Remain here. Ah... Malfoy."

Mr Malfoy's head jerked up. Before Draco left, he might have been at the Dark Lord's right hand; now he'd been exiled to the far end of the room, lowest among the Marked Death Eaters. But he still stayed close by. Pansy couldn't help but wonder whether he was hoping for a chance to redeem himself, or for an opportunity to beg for Draco's life if he were caught.

"Yes, my Lord?"

"The Weasley girl is a traitor. Bring her to me."

"I - yes, my Lord."

Pansy folded her hands behind her back and watched as Mr Malfoy left. Ginny had been hoping to take out as many of them as possible, hadn't she? This wasn't exactly helpful. Maybe she ought to try to suggest that some of the others followed him - though it wasn't as though turning Ginny in had bought her _that_ kind of trust, really. But... maybe the Dark Lord would anyway? If Ginny beat Mr Malfoy dramatically enough, _obviously_ the Dark Lord would send more Death Eaters after her. He couldn't afford to let her escape, not with the amount of information she must have collected. If -

There was a muffled _boom_ , and the room shook. Pansy staggered into the wall, clutching at her wand as it slipped from her sleeve.

" _Go!_ " the Dark Lord shouted, gesturing at the door. A few Death Eaters peeled away from the pack and ran for it, and then a few more followed suit. How many? Eight? Ten? A dozen? Pansy wasn't sure. But it was enough to set her heart racing and her stomach churning. They'd had years of practise at killing, and what did Ginny have? Schoolyard lessons in duelling? Some useful memories?

Pansy did her best to remind herself that Ginny wasn't going into this blind. She'd probably set herself up somewhere that'd be good for ambushes, or that had a good chokepoint. She wouldn't be facing every one of them at once. And even if Ginny did, she must have known some good area-of-effect spells, the kind she'd used when she was duelling Pansy - whatever that explosion had been would probably be good, come to think of it -

There were no more explosions. Just a terrible, mounting silence. Wherever Ginny was, it was far enough away to hide the sounds of battle.

Pansy would rather have been able to hear it.

She glanced around, hoping the remaining Death Eaters would be distracted enough that they wouldn't notice her taking stock of her surroundings. Some of them might assume it was because this was the first time she'd been permitted this close to the Dark Lord, but not all of them would. Most of them were staring towards the doorway, though, waiting for the others to come back with their prisoner, so it seemed as good a time as any to find the snake.

The snake was to the Dark Lord's left, curled up in a pile in front of a small fireplace. It was much larger than Pansy had realised, and she felt a bolt of relief that Ginny had given her the Fiendfyre potion; getting a Cutting Curse through _that_ would have been difficult, even if she hadn't had to worry about protective spells. There wasn't anything obvious on the snake right now, but not all shield spells were visible, and she'd be surprised if the Dark Lord left his prized pet undefended even here. And if it were a magical variety - and it could have been, for all Pansy knew; they'd touched on magical snakes in Care of Magical Creatures, but since none of them were native to Britain they'd never done them in-depth enough for her to be sure - it'd probably have spell-resistant scales.

Pansy's hand went to the potions vial at her waist, hidden beneath the drape of her overrobe. She could feel the heat of it even through the layers of protection. Maybe it was burning through the spells? She wouldn't be surprised. Fiendfyre was supposed to be able to burn _anything_. She was astounded Ginny's supplier had managed to find a potions vial it wouldn't destroy immediately, frankly. Whatever spells were around that snake, it'd definitely be able to get rid of them. The trick would be getting away without letting it kill _her_.

"Crabbe," the Dark Lord growled. "Go. Find out what's taking them so long."

Vince's father bowed and jogged away, wand in hand.

The silence seemed to become more and more suffocating. The Dark Lord was tense, fingers restless on his wand, and so everyone else in the room was too. Even the snake seemed to realise something was happening, slithering over to curl around its master's feet; Pansy was wildly tempted, just for a moment, to throw the Fiendfyre and be done with them both.

The quiet was broken by a window creaking open. It felt like everyone in the room turned at the same time, wands at the ready, curses on their lips. Even Pansy was surprised to find hers in her hand, though she didn't join the chorus of spells.

Feathers drifted to the floor. The Death Eaters broke off awkwardly, lowering their wands and clearing their throats.

"Was there a message attached?" the Dark Lord asked.

One of the Death Eaters hurried over, a smoking scrap of parchment in hand. The Dark Lord accepted it, brows furrowed as he read.

"It seems the spy may have been found at the best possible moment," he said finally, crumpling it. "Potter has shown himself. We march on Hogwarts tonight."

Pansy sucked in a breath as the Death Eaters chorused their agreement. This was it. This was what Ginny had been talking about. She had to be ready.

The Death Eaters seemed to have the same opinion; they began rushing in and out, fetching heavy battle robes or masks or handfuls of healing potions. Pansy caught a glimpse of Theo by the door, face tight with anxiety, before his father dropped a set of robes over his head. Nobody did the same for her. Maybe that was a prerogative for the children of Death Eaters, or maybe they weren't supposed to be doing it at all and his father was counting on everyone else being too distracted to notice him outfitting his son. Pansy couldn't complain, since she didn't really want to have to shed Death Eater gear on her way to Hogwarts. Wearing it after she'd made her escape seemed like asking for an accident to happen, really.

Finally Mr Crabbe reappeared, shouldering through the crowd to drop to one knee before the Dark Lord. "She got away, my Lord."

"Explain."

"Weasley blew a hole in the wall - that was the explosion, I think. Got herself into a corner where she'd be hard to aim at and stood there cursing us until she'd been hit one too many times, then hopped on a broom and flew straight out. Must've had some kind of workaround for the wards - they didn't stop her."

The Dark Lord's already-thin lips tightened even further. "Despite the training of my Death Eaters - despite their vaunted knowledge of the Dark Arts - you could not bring down a _girl?_ A slip of a thing raised to hate the Dark Arts, with no teacher but a memory in a diary? If Potter hadn't shown himself, you'd all be paying in blood. As it is... heal the injured and get them into their battle robes. You will all fight on the front lines today. And as for _you_..."

"Me, my Lord?" Pansy squeaked.

"Had the Weasley girl's treachery stayed hidden, no doubt she would have cursed my Death Eaters in the back as we fought, and created even more carnage than she has already." His lip curled. "You have served me well today. Walk by my side as we go into battle."

"My Lord..." On the one hand, getting to the snake wouldn't be hard. On the other, she _really_ did not want to be this close to the Dark Lord when she did it. "You honour me."

"Yes. I do." The Dark Lord turned back to the Death Eaters, watching as the bustle began to calm and they lined up before him. "My Death Eaters. Today is the day that we will finally crush all resistance before us and take Wizarding Britain for our own. The Ministry has already bowed before us: now all that is left is the Order, that's cowered in hiding since the death of Dumbledore..."

Pansy tuned his speech out, going through a last panicked inventory. She had her wand. She had the potion, and it was easy to access. Her robes weren't ready at all for battle, but what was she supposed to do about that now? Pansy had a plan. She knew how to Apparate. All she needed was a moment. _This_ moment might have been nice - she'd really like to just get it over with - except for the part where she couldn't escape, and was also directly in the eyeline of every single Death Eater. They'd probably object to her attempt to kill the Dark Lord's favoured pet, even if they had no more idea than she did why it was important.

"And so," the Dark Lord declared, "we march on Hogwarts!"

Pansy hastily joined the cheering, fingers wrapped white-knuckled around her wand. Then the Death Eaters turned and began filing out.

This was it.

They re-assembled in a field outside the manor, each clutching Portkeys that would set them down somewhere outside Hogwarts. Pansy kept shooting panicked glances at the snake wrapped around the Dark Lord's shoulders, which she hoped came across as hero-worship of him rather than anything else; there'd been one terrifying moment when she'd been sure it'd refuse to come out into the cooler air. It'd been one thing to plan to 'accidentally' get left behind when she thought she'd be in with the foot soldiers, and entirely another now.

"On three," a nasally-voiced Death Eater called out. "One - two -"

Pansy slammed down in a different field entirely, reflexively casting a warming charm as the chilly Scottish air bit. All around her were voices doing the same.

"My Lord," Mr Nott said, "shall we march on Hogwarts now? Or wait for word from Snape?"

The Dark Lord tapped his fingers on his thigh. "Move into the Forest. The wards are weaker there. I'll wait a little for Snape, but if Potter's in the castle he may already be dead or captured. I will _not_ give up on this opportunity for lack of information."

"Of course, my Lord." Mr Nott strode away and began directing them toward the Forbidden Forest. Pansy couldn't help a smirk; Draco might have exaggerated every story he'd ever told about his father, but Theo hadn't, and she knew for a fact his father hadn't had this kind of authority before. The moment a power vacuum opened up he'd stepped right into it. Typical.

The Forbidden Forest was unpleasantly dark and ominous, but not as immediately dangerous as she'd expected from the way it'd been talked about at Hogwarts. Maybe that was because they were approaching it from the Muggle side, though; she supposed it would cause problems if the alleged werewolves could come out and attack people who had no idea what they even were every full moon. There must be some kind of repulsion charm on it to keep everything inside, protecting the Muggles and the creatures in equal measure. The Death Eaters around her were still clutching at their wands, though, so she didn't let her guard down.

After a little while the trees began thinning again. The Dark Lord walked to the front of the pack, Pansy a few steps behind him, and stared out at the great bulk of the castle. Before them lay the Black Lake, sunlight glittering off its surface. 

"I will give him," the Dark Lord announced to nobody in particular, "five more minutes." He set the snake down. It wriggled around in the leaves in apparent enjoyment.

Should she try to kill it now? Pansy had no idea whether the anti-Apparition wards on Hogwarts' grounds extended to the Forbidden Forest. Surely the wards wouldn't apply to all of the Forest? It was an awfully large area to cover. But they were quite close to the grounds now, too... Pansy ought to have tried earlier. But there were too many eyes on her before they'd Portkeyed, and after, and she'd been too worried as they picked their way through the Forest to take her hand off her wand. It might _have_ to be now. When else could she do it? During the fight, when any stray curse could send the vial off target? No. She'd have to -

"My Lord!" someone called. "Snape's here!"

The Dark Lord turned on his heel, frowning. "Bring him to me!"

Pansy backed towards the lake, doing her best to get out of his eyesight without giving away what she was doing. The snake was there. The Dark Lord wasn't paying attention to it. He was distracted. She could -

Then Snape came into view, and all thoughts of her plan fled.

"You didn't come from the castle," the Dark Lord said, frowning.

"I'm afraid not, my Lord," Snape said, gasping in pain as he bowed. "There were... complications."

"Have there," the Dark Lord said. "And violent ones, too, it seems. What has happened to you, Severus?"

Pansy's eyes widened as Snape straightened up again. Dried blood coated the lower half of his face, his hair and robes were dripping wet, and the way he leaned suggested there was something wrong with his leg.

"The wards," Snape said, grimacing. "Somebody got into them. I was physically thrown from the grounds - I was lucky to hit the lake on my way down, since I couldn't cast magic on the grounds, either. Amycus and Alecto were also cast out, though I regret to say their landing sites were less fortunate. I had a few of Hogsmeade's Death Eaters try to enter, and they could only go onto the grounds until their Marks crossed the wards, at which point they were stopped."

"I see." The Dark Lord's eyes gleamed red. "Do you know _why_ they chose this moment to attack, Severus?"

"Potter, of course. He managed to find some way into the school - led the students into rebellion - we fought back, of course, but they took a few loyal students hostage, and while we were trying to get them out the wards triggered."

Pansy wasn't sure she believed Potter and his friends would take hostages. Though maybe Snape was playing the situation up, or hadn't understood what was going on; she _could_ believe that watching the Carrows torture their classmates might have turned seemingly-loyal students against the Dark Lord, especially since Daphne's attempts to keep her sister saying something they'd all regret had been a full-time job even before then. Astoria had probably insisted they use her as a human shield, or something else equally dangerous.

"Potter's at Hogwarts?" the Dark Lord said, leaning forwards. "Alone?"

Snape shook his head. "He brought allies. Weasley and Granger. It didn't seem as though any of the other members of the Order followed them."

Beside the Dark Lord the snake twitched. Pansy couldn't help but glance at it. Was this the moment? The Dark Lord was certainly distracted. Though she might have a hard time escaping; it'd all depend on whether the potion worked the way Ginny had told her, she supposed. Pansy hadn't ever seen Fiendfyre, but from what she'd heard it would probably be quite an effective diversion. Nobody would be able to chase her if they were trying to put the fire out - as long as she could get away before it came after _her_.

"My Lord," Snape said suddenly, taking a dragging step closer to him. "There may be a way to get information out of Hogwarts still. Not all of your followers have been Marked yet -"

Pansy could see where this was going. Whoever went would have to be utterly trustworthy, and she'd done more in the last hour to endear herself to him than any of the others. She shoved her hand into her robes - if he turned to look at her she'd never get it out before he could curse her, and if he sent her away to Hogwarts she'd never get a second chance - Merlin, when had she become so self-sacrificial? The sensible thing here would be to take her chance and run for it like Tracey had. Get so far away nobody could find her. And yet her hands kept moving, sliding the vial out and slipping it out of its wrappings, feeling blistering heat against her fingertips, and _Merlin_ she hoped it broke when she threw it or she'd have wasted her best chance to escape on the world's least effective sabotage -

The Dark Lord was turning towards her. The whole world seemed slowed, time trickling through honey, time enough for her to see the twist of his foot and the shift of his robes and realise she was going to throw the vial anyway. At least Pansy had already decided she was all right with dying.

"Perhaps Theodore Nott, my Lord?" Snape said, voice too loud, and Pansy's arm snapped out.

For a moment all she could do was watch it twirling through the air, a perfect arc towards the snake. Then someone cried out. A curse sang over Pansy's head, and she ducked and stumbled back. The vial was falling, falling, and any moment now the rest of them would realise what was happening, and -

With a twist, she Apparated away, just as a surge of heat struck her.

Everything hurt.

Pansy opened her eyes and immediately squeezed them shut again. The sky above her seemed impossibly bright, especially contrasted against her throbbing head. She licked dry lips and realised her mouth tasted of copper. Ugh.

She must be outside. Lying on rocks, maybe, because there was something cold digging into her back, and under full sun, because every bit of exposed skin was throbbing hot and painful. What had _happened?_

"Are you awake?" somebody said behind her.

"No."

There was a pause. Then a more familiar voice said, "We don't appreciate sarcasm."

"Astoria?"

A storm of whispers erupted behind her, largely along the lines that Astoria needed to be _quiet_ , she couldn't talk to the enemy, so on and so forth. Pansy took the moment of peace to try opening her eyes again. There was definitely something wrong with them; the light was hurting them a _lot_ , and everything was swimming, dizzyingly out of focus.

"What are you doing here?" the first voice demanded.

"I have no idea where I am." Well, Pansy had a few guesses. She'd been aiming for the gates at the other side of Hogwarts, and given that Astoria hadn't graduated yet, it seemed like a good bet she'd made it. But it didn't seem like a good idea to give up information to people who clearly had no idea she was on their side. "If we can clear that bit up, I might be able to help you."

More whispers. Pansy poked herself in the arm and winced. As unpleasantly warm as she was, it almost felt like she was - oh. Of course. The Fiendfyre. If it turned out she'd gotten all her hair burned off because she was too much of an idiot to Apparate away before it hit...

"You're at Hogwarts," the stranger said finally.

"Oh, good. Is Ginny Weasley here?"

"Do you really think we're going to give you that kind of information?"

Pansy sighed. "I don't think you want to, no. I _do_ think that if you tell her Pansy Parkinson's lying on the front doorstep, you might actually get to find out what's going on."

The group behind her started arguing quietly again. Pansy had a hard time suppressing her sigh. Honestly, it was like they'd brought a committee. She hadn't ever thought she'd be glad to be undercover with barely any backup, but if this was what the Order was usually like, she could live without it.

"Ginny's coming down from the castle anyway, can't you see?" Astoria said loudly. "So we might as well stop arguing and just wait for her."

They subsided into quiet grumbles. Pansy wondered if they'd agree to shift her off whatever was sticking her in the back if she asked. Probably not, given how they'd reacted to her, though maybe Astoria would go for it. They'd known each other for long enough, hadn't they?

"Pansy!" Ginny said, breathless. "What are you doing down there?"

"I feel like I've been hit all over with Bludgeoning Charms and there's something wrong with my eyes. What do you think?"

"Fair enough. Hang on, I'll just come around..." The gate clattered and a cool shadow fell over Pansy's face. "You look terrible."

"Thanks ever so," Pansy said.

"Here. Drink this." Ginny pressed a vial to Pansy's lips; Pansy swallowed obediently, and then yelped as ice seemed to run through her.

"What was _that?_ "

"Healing potion." Ginny poked Pansy's hand. "You look less red. Try opening your eyes?"

Pansy opened her eyes cautiously, tension running out of her body when they turned out to be back to normal. "You just had that ready?"

"It did occur to me that you might not get out of the Fiendfyre in time, yes."

"And you couldn't have given it to _me?_ " Pansy asked, scowling.

Ginny shrugged. "What if you'd pulled the wrong one out?"

"Obviously I would have kept it in a different pocket." Pansy winced as Ginny tapped the back of her head with her wand. "What's that?"

"I think you hit your head on the gates when you landed."

"Oh. No wonder it feels like that." Pansy dabbed at the back of her head, grimacing at the blood on her fingers. "What's going on?"

"Waiting, mostly. Shoring up the defences. If the Dark Lord doesn't show soon, Harry's going to start taunting him, but we're hoping your attack will get him riled up enough he'll just come storming in." Ginny paused. "You got the snake, right?"

"I was Apparating out when the vial hit, but it should've landed exactly on top. So probably?"

"Good enough." Ginny turned towards the castle and muttered a spell, sending two streaks of silvery light towards the towers. "Come on, we'd better get inside. And you lot - it's probably only a matter of time at this point. Find your teams, start getting ready. Eat now if you need to, because we don't know how long it'll be until we get a break. Go on, get up there!"

The students who'd been watching her, a motley assortment from what looked like every house, started jogging towards the castle. Astoria cast a few curious glances behind her, but followed the rest. That was much more surprising than her choice to join up, given that her usual response to being told to do something was to ask why; Pansy was impressed.

She and Ginny followed more slowly, Pansy wincing as she stretched aching muscles. She was sure the walk up to the school hadn't always been this long. Maybe it was because she didn't usually go all the way from the gates on foot, or because despite the potions she was still tired and aching. Ginny seemed happy enough to walk slowly beside her, though, so Pansy supposed whatever she had to do next couldn't be that urgent.

Still... "Don't you have anything you should be doing? I'd gotten the impression every moment of your time was scheduled."

"It was," Ginny said with a shrug. "But now everything that needs doing can be done by someone else. It's a relief, honestly."

Pansy glanced sideways at her. "Can I ask what needs doing, or..."

"Oh, it won't be a secret for long. Up -"

A bloodcurdling scream and a cloud of oily black smoke burst from the top of the Astronomy Tower.

"Oh good. He got my message."

"Sorry?" Pansy said, staring up at the tower. After spending so long in a manor full of Dark artefacts, she could almost feel the magic beating against her skin.

"Tom made a series of Dark items that were - well, it's probably safer not to say what they were for until we know he's dead, just in case you come face to face with him in the fight, but they're _very_ important to him, and we need to destroy them before or during this fight. We've been picking them off for years, one after the other, but there were a few that were out of our reach until recently."

"The snake?" Pansy said, blinking. "But - won't he know you're destroying them and change his plans? Considering..."

"What you did earlier today?" Ginny finished. "Maybe. But he thinks he's smarter than we are. What do you think is more likely: that he realises we've discovered his deepest secret, or that he assumes you were trying to kill him?"

Pansy blinked. "Right. Okay. That makes sense. And that thing up there..."

"The last but one. That one..." Ginny glanced away, lips pressed together. "It'll be the hardest to destroy. And the most dangerous. That's Harry's job."

"So you were sent to the Death Eaters to get the snake, then?"

"And see if there was anybody I could turn, and gather information in case Tom had some grand plan we weren't prepared to deal with, and come up with a plan to steal the object Neville just destroyed - it was in the possession of a Death Eater, before. I doubt anybody's noticed it's been replaced with a fake yet, since they've all had much more important things to do than dig around in a dead woman's vault. There was a lot that needed to be dealt with before we reached this point. Now all I have to do is kill Death Eaters - once they show up, anyway."

"Maybe they're all on fire." Which was a worse thought than Pansy had realised. She'd never killed anything bigger than an insect before. Had that changed? Had she killed someone she'd known - a classmate, one of her parents' friends, someone like her who'd accepted an invitation to join because they didn't see any other choice? Would she ever know for sure?

That was what the battle was going to be. People trying to kill her, and the people around her. Could Pansy do it again, deliberately this time? Or would she hesitate at the critical moment?

"Pansy." Ginny took her arm, turning her so they were gazing into each other's eyes. "It's all right."

"Is it?"

"They would have done worse to you if they'd known."

"Would it have been, though? Really? Fire is..." Pansy's stomach turned over at the thought.

"It's a war," Ginny said fiercely. "And the Death Eaters they started it. If they didn't want to risk their lives, they should've just let us all live in peace in the first place."

"I -"

The rest of Pansy's thought was lost in a great echoing _bong_. The very air seemed to shiver around them, and she clutched Ginny's arms, sure she'd fall at any moment.

"They're here," Ginny breathed as the sound faded out. "Come on - you aren't fit to fight, not on the front lines -"

They hurried up the hill towards the castle. There were lines of people filing out of it, dressed in a random assortment of armoured robes - some in dragonhide, some in an Auror's properly enchanted set, the rest with rune-bound _Protego_ s held up by hasty embroidery or jewellery so newly made it shone. A group peeled off towards the greenhouses as she watched, muttering among themselves about whether the Venomous Tentacula would stand up to movement, while another started transfiguring barricades along the wardline.

"This is..."

Ginny nodded. "The Order's had a lot of time to plan and make contacts. Apparently a lot of Aurors started reaching out after the Muggle-born Registration Commission started up, and some of them had friends in the professional duelling circuit - oh, here they are."

Pansy trailed to a halt. There was a lot to look at - the duellers were all wearing seriously high-quality gear, talking strategy in soft voices like they weren't doing anything more worrying than a pairs tournament - but her eyes were drawn to the youngest in the group, charming ash-blonde hair out of her face with a determined expression.

How long had it been since she'd seen Tracey? A year and a half? It felt longer. Like seeing someone she'd thought she'd known in Diagon Alley, only to find a stranger looking back at her.

"I'm glad to see you here," Tracey said, politely, as if they'd met at a society ball.

"I'm not. I thought you were _leaving_."

"It seemed safer not to say."

Pansy grimaced. She hadn't been wrong. Unfortunately.

"We should talk once this is all over," Tracey added. "Not now. I need to be ready to..."

"Yes. Of course." Pansy bit her tongue. It seemed like a bad idea to blurt out something like _assuming we both survive_ in front of her. Like she was wishing them bad luck.

"I really am glad, though."

"I didn't do it for you," Pansy snapped, and then winced.

Tracey rolled her eyes. "Don't worry. I didn't think you did."

"We need to get going," Ginny said. "The Death Eaters are coming, remember?"

"Right. I..."

"Once it's over," Tracey repeated.

"Yeah. Okay." She let Ginny pull her away, trying not to get too distracted. It was probably a lost cause, though. What had Tracey been _thinking?_

"Healing potions or no healing potions, you aren't up to a head-on fight," Ginny said as they entered the castle. "We've got hidey-holes set up in the walls. Curse from a distance - even if you don't hit them, it'll get them nervous - and once they're close enough we've got potions you can throw through their shields."

"Until they swap to conjuring barriers."

"At which point you can start cursing again," Ginny said, shrugging. "Bombarda, if nothing else."

"Right."

They stopped by a staircase. A boy Pansy found vaguely familiar pressed a carrying-case and some kind of enchanted token ("It'll direct you to a safe vantage,") into her hands, and then it seemed like there was nothing left to say.

"I suppose I'll see you on the other side." It seemed like an utterly trite statement to Pansy after everything that'd happened. But what else _could_ she say?

Ginny seemed to be at every bit as much of a loss for words, though. "I guess so. Yeah." She shifted from foot to foot, glancing around at the bustle.

"Are you going to be hexing from a distance too?" Obviously not, since Ginny didn't have a kit, but Pansy had to say _something_.

"No. I'm going out with the next group after your friend's. We're hoping the Death Eaters will find the sight of a traitor distracting."

"Should you really be fighting after this morning?" Pansy asked, frowning.

"Probably not. I'm still going to, though. It's not like anyone has the luxury of sitting it out at this point."

"I suppose." Did that mean Draco was here? Surely not, after what Ginny had said about the Order not wanting him to fight. "Just... try to stay safe?"

"I will. I promise." Ginny hesitated for a moment, staring at her, and then lunged forwards. Pansy gasped as Ginny's arms wrapped around her; then she squeezed Ginny tight, burying her face in her shoulder and breathing in deeply. If this was going to be the last time they saw each other, she wanted to savour it.

Magic rippled through the air, sending every hair on Pansy's body upright. She and Ginny jerked away from each other.

"The wards?" Pansy asked.

"Probably. I should go." Ginny squeezed her hands and then backed away. "I'll see you later. All right?"

Pansy watched her go for a moment, and then started the long trudge up to her assigned vantage.

"It's over!"

Pansy's head jerked up. "What?"

Nobody was around to hear her, of course. They'd all had to move around as the battle progressed and one hidey-hole after another was targeted by the Death Eaters; Pansy was fairly sure nobody else had ended up on this particular section of wall.

Who'd called out? Was it a Death Eater, or a member of the Order? Leaving her hole without getting some kind of confirmation seemed like a bad idea. Pansy bit her lip in thought, and then charmed the stone in front of her transparent, staring out onto the grounds.

There was a crowd off in the distance. It was moving towards the castle - quite quickly, actually - she leaned forwards, pressing her nose against the stone. It didn't _look_ like they were wearing Death Eaters' masks -

There! Potter, being carried along by the crowd. He was smiling.

Merlin.

It _was_ over.

Pansy cancelled her charm and slumped back, staring up at the ceiling.

What now?

Well. Pansy ought to get out of the wall, probably. Go see if the Healers had enough free time to check on her mostly-healed burns. Find out if Ginny was alive - and if not, find out who else she might have told that she'd recruited Pansy, because she was _not_ about to end up in Azkaban just because the Order couldn't keep track of its spies. Maybe she could even go see Draco. She had a hell of a lot of questions to ask him.

Pansy just had to drag herself up.

The Great Hall was surprisingly loud.

When Pansy thought about it, it made sense. There must have been a lot of people on the Order's side, if only because the Carrows had done a spectacular job of convincing people to keep away from the Death Eaters. All of those people had wounds to heal, friends to find or to mourn, stories to tell -

But did they really have to do it all at once, right here?

Pansy edged into the hall, staring around. No blond hair anywhere she could see, but then, she'd known Draco might not be here. Plenty of red, but that didn't exactly narrow it down; there were the twin Weasleys going one way, and Ronald going another, and -

Pansy stopped in her tracks. There on the other side was Ginny, hair half fallen out of its braid, clothing scorched and scarred, but _alive_. And there next to her - standing very close -

Potter.

They'd dated. Not for long - and it'd been a while ago - unless they'd been seeing each other after they'd left school but before Ginny had joined the Death Eaters. She didn't seem like the kind of person to mix something as serious as war with flirtation, but hadn't Ginny kept flirting with Pansy even after she'd recruited her? Maybe she'd kept going with Potter too once they'd gotten out of the public eye. Or they'd separated but promised to try again once the war was over. It seemed like the kind of thing he'd do. Soft-hearted. Romantic.

Not like Pansy. She was practical. If Ginny wanted to go back to Potter now that things were going to go back to normal... well, _they_ hadn't made any promises, had they? Pansy couldn't hold her to something she'd never said. There wasn't any point crying over it like she had with Draco; it hadn't been the same kind of thing at all. She'd just have to move on.

Potter bent his head closer to Ginny's. Did she like that he was taller than her? Some people did, or so Pansy had heard. It'd never really mattered to her.

Their faces were very close together now. Pansy knew she ought to look away. She didn't want Ginny thinking she'd read something into their relationship that'd never been there. She couldn't quite tear her eyes away, though. Maybe -

Potter wrapped his arms around Ginny. She clung to him like a lover, and now, _now_ Pansy couldn't watch. She jerked her head around, staring blindly out at the room. There was plenty to look at - Healers, reunions, friends and families huddled together in grief - but she couldn't quite manage to focus on any of it.

Pansy sank down onto the floor, grimacing. This was ridiculous, and she needed to get over it.

She should be _happy_. She was alive. She was on the right side. Draco was alive somewhere too, probably, assuming he hadn't been asked to fight. Everything was good! Hell, for all she knew she might be a heroine. Spying on the Dark Lord had to be good for something, right?

"Are you all right? You look a little shellshocked."

Pansy blinked up at Ginny, who appeared to have detached herself from Potter. "I'm... fine."

"Are you sure? You don't sound fine." Ginny dropped down onto the floor beside Pansy, stretching her legs out.

"I'm sure. What was all that about?" Pansy said, jerking her head at Potter.

Ginny smirked. "Jealous?"

"Of course not. He's far too earnest for your taste."

"Now, yes. When I was twelve... not so much." Ginny sighed, slumping against Pansy's shoulder. "He was one of the first people I told about this idea, and one of the first who agreed we ought to go for it. I thought I should find him, after. Though I hadn't expected to find Harry _alive_."

"I suppose they would've been targeting him. Boy Who Lived and all." Pansy didn't dare move. It wasn't like she'd never touched Ginny before, but... never in public. And Ginny hadn't shown weakness in front of anyone at all since she'd joined the Death Eaters. That she was doing it now meant - what? That she was just too tired to keep the façade up? That she felt safe enough here to let her guard down? That she wanted something else from Pansy?

"That and other things, yes. He has a genius for getting himself into trouble." Ginny sighed again. "I wish I could just go somewhere quiet and sleep for a week."

"You could. Who'd stop you?"

"My parents. My brothers. The Aurors who want to know details about all the Death Eaters and associates who got away. And I need to make sure people know that you're on our side, and Malfoy, and Percy - he's been in the Ministry pretending to be more interested in paper-pushing than the war so he could pass us information, and I'm sure somebody will try to get him up on charges of collaboration... and Snape, too, assuming he survived -"

"Snape?" Pansy said, blinking.

"Who do you think adjusted the Hogwarts wards to keep anyone with a Dark Mark out? Which may not be enough to get him off - I know Snape and Dumbledore must've had some kind of plan, but he wouldn't tell me and for all I know he might just walk up to the Wizengamot and tell them he killed Dumbledore because, I don't know, he'd spent the last decade getting angrier and angrier about Dumbledore's fashion choices - but I have to try."

Pansy bit her lip. "Snape was Headmaster when the Carrows were here, though. And... just because they didn't go after me doesn't mean I wasn't terrified of them. It had to have been worse for your lot."

"What was he supposed to do, tell Voldemort no?" Ginny asked, shrugging. "He did his best with the hand he was dealt, the same as any of us. If he'd really wanted Voldemort to win he would've just told him I was a spy when I came to join the Death Eaters. He knew."

Pansy sighed. "I'm just saying it won't be as easy as telling the Wizengamot he was good all along."

"I know. I just... I have to try."

Ginny fell silent, tucking her head against Pansy's neck and staring out into the distance. Pansy did her best to act as though this was something normal for them.

"What are you going to do?" Ginny asked eventually.

"Sorry?"

"It's over now. You weren't ever involved in the worst of it, and you were crucial to the Order's victory - don't worry, I'll make sure the Aurors know. What will you do next?"

Pansy couldn't help the half-hysterical laugh that escaped her. "You really think I know?"

"I think you're a lot more together than some of your ex-classmates thought."

"You knew I was listening in on you and Blaise all along, didn't you? Merlin. Anyway... I don't know. Sleep somewhere I don't have to worry about Death Eaters getting at me? Honestly, I never thought about this kind of future. When I was younger I thought I'd marry Draco and become a society wife, and then the obvious path was becoming a Death Eater, and now..."

"You could still marry him, you know," Ginny said in a studiously neutral tone. "Malfoy's on our side too. I suppose the Dumbledore thing might count against him, but he was pressured into signing up, and he's made some very obvious amends. There's really nothing to stop you."

"Other than that we made a terrible couple, and he wouldn't have been nearly as interested in me if I hadn't spent so much time propping his ego up? Nothing at all." Pansy shot a glance at Ginny. "And you're a fine one to talk about jealousy."

"Well, I wouldn't want you to have any regrets." Ginny paused. " _I_ wouldn't."

"None at all? But your mother - I mean, I wouldn't mind upsetting _mine_ , and in any case if she didn't want me to end up romancing someone politically appropriate she shouldn't have spent so much time telling me I needed to marry somebody who had real power, not just money - but I expect yours are different."

Ginny snorted. "I've got six older brothers. If my mother doesn't like you, she'll just have to learn to live with it. And Percy'll distract her for ages, anyway - he hasn't talked to most of the family for years now. Needed to look like they were estranged, you know, even after he'd worked out Dumbledore wasn't lying."

"Well, then," Pansy said, fumbling around until she found Ginny's hand and clutching it. She felt like her heart was pounding in her throat, so loudly that surely everyone would hear it, everyone would look over and see. Around them, the bustle of reunions and running Healers and grief continued unabated. "That's one thing I'll be doing next, I suppose."

"A politically appropriate romance?" Ginny asked, shooting her a sly look.

"Not by my mother's standards, since she'd want it to end with pureblood babies and society hostessing. Somehow I suspect this'll be a good bit more interesting than that."

"You could join the Ministry," Ginny said. "I expect they'll need a lot of positions filled in the near future, considering all this."

Pansy shuddered. "That sounds dire. No thank you."

"But consider this: everyone will probably be too nervous around the war heroine Death Eater spy to give you any kind of trouble."

"A slight improvement, but still dire, honestly. What about you? Don't tell me you're trying to convince me to join up so we'll see each other in the elevators, or something mushy like that?"

"For a little while, maybe," Ginny said. "So I can make sure we deal with all the Death Eaters properly this time. No more bribing the Wizengamot or lying about the Imperius, nothing that'll end with another war fifteen years down the track. After that... who knows? We've got time."

"We do." It almost didn't feel real. Not just the time - though the knowledge that Pansy wouldn't spend every day weighed down by the pressure of an imminent future she didn't want was astounding all by itself - but the _space_. She could do anything. Anything at all. "You know what? You should see if you can play professional Quidditch."

"Seriously?" A funny little grin quirked Ginny's lips. How many of Ginny's smiles hadn't she seen yet? "That seems a little frivolous."

"Exactly," Pansy said. "You've done the life-and-death stakes job. Why not go for something a little bit lighter? And anyway, I've seen you play. I know you enjoy it."

"I do. Maybe you're right. I'll go to a couple of tryouts once everything's calmed down a bit. But you have to come up with something equally frivolous to do, all right?"

Pansy let herself relax against Ginny. "I will. With a little bit of time."

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much to asuralucier for doing a fabulous beta job far faster than I could have hoped for!
> 
> Title is (misquoted) from Tonight Alive's 'Crack My Heart'.


End file.
